Workers in the food and drink service industry are more likely to suffer minimum wage violations than workers in other industries

Shares of workers in select industries experiencing minimum wage violations

Industry Share of workforce demographic experiencing minimum wage violations
Food and drink service 14.3% 
Agriculture, forestry, and fishing 9.1% 
Leisure and hospitality, excluding food and drink 6.8%
Retail 4.7%  

Industries of workers experiencing minimum wage violations

Industry Share of workers experiencing minimum wage violations
Food and drink service 25.9% 
Retail 14.8% 
Education and health 13.4%
Other industries 12.0% 
Professional and business 7.9% 
Manufacturing 5.4% 
Other leisure and hospitality 5.1% 
Transportation and utilities 4.0% 
Financial activities 3.5% 
Construction 3.2% 
Agriculture, forestry, and fishing 1.8% 
Wholesale 1.7% 
Information 1.5% 

Note: Industries with the highest rates of minimum wage violations are shown. Other industry-specific data can be found in Appendix Table A3.

Sample includes workers age 16 to 85 in the ten most populous states: California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas.

Source: EPI analysis of Current Population Survey Outgoing Rotation Group data, 2013–2015

View the underlying data on epi.org.