Key takeaways

• The label “right to work” is intentionally misleading. RTW laws provide no job protections. What they do is make it harder for workers to form and sustain strong unions.
• RTW laws are intended to weaken unions. They are linked to lower unionization rates, lower wages and benefits, and worse safety outcomes for all workers.
• RTW laws have racist, anti-union origins dating to the 1940s. For decades, big business and white supremacist groups promoted RTW laws to diminish workers’ collective bargaining rights and block multiracial organizing.
• RTW laws don’t boost job growth but do erode job quality and increase inequality.
• Trends on RTW are reversing. No state has adopted a new RTW law since 2017, and multiple states have repealed or rejected RTW.

The bill includes a combined $71.9 million cut for the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Further, the measure implements a 3% cut to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). While the legislation slightly increases funding for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) that the Trump administration has weaponized for political reasons, the amount overall remains insufficient. The appropriations measure now moves to the Senate, where the budget cuts face an uncertain future.

If enacted, these reductions would further strain these agencies that have faced over a decade of flat funding that hasn’t accounted for inflation or rising labor force participation (see Figure A). This chronic underfunding has severely impacted their ability to enforce worker protection laws.

Figure A

The consequences of underfunding worker protection agencies

The Department of Labor serves the nation’s workers by administering and enforcing most federal worker protection laws, such as the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and the Family and Medical Leave Act. Within this framework, WHD ensures that workers receive wages earned while OHSA evaluates safe workplace conditions and standards. Moreover, independent agencies such as the EEOC enforce a range of anti-discrimination laws while the NLRB enforces private-sector labor law, including workers’ rights to a union and collective bargaining. Together, these government agencies are designed to equip workers with the tools to combat workplace abuses and rectify unequal bargaining power. However, enforcement agencies are unable to fulfill their mandates with reduced staffing and resources.

Since 1992, OSHA has experienced a 16.0% decrease in inspectors. OSHA has been left with so few resources that it would take 191 years for its inspectors to visit every workplace under its coverage just once. Furthermore, a recent Government Accountability Office report flagged critical agency shortcomings, noting OSHA’s weak efforts to address the rising tide of workplace violence against health care and social service workers.

WHD has faced similar staffing challenges. The number of WHD investigators is at its lowest point since at least 1973, despite being tasked with protecting many more workers. As a result, the total number of resolved WHD investigations has dropped significantly over the past few years (see Figure B).

Figure B

Meanwhile, the EEOC has experienced an uptick in discrimination claims over the decades alongside rising labor force participation, yet its resources have not matched the pace of these shifts. For the NLRB, funding for the agency has remained flat except for a recent $6 million reduction in case-handling. The lack of funding has severely impacted field offices—the primary point of contact for union elections—with six closing between 2014 to 2025. In 2024, the NLRB released a statement describing their struggle to meet responsibilities such as conducting hearings and elections amid funding and staffing shortages. The consequence of these challenges is evident. Although favorability for unions nears a record high, major efforts to undermine worker organizing persist.

House budget cuts would leave workers more vulnerable to exploitation

If enacted, the House’s budget cuts would exacerbate an already precarious workplace reality. There were 5,070 fatal work injuries in 2024, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (see Figure C). Put another way, a worker died every 104 minutes from a work-related injury. Foreign-born Latinx workers were disproportionately impacted. Reducing OSHA funding and staffing will make it even harder to ensure preventable deaths do not occur.

Figure C

Additionally, amid eroding worker protections, workers have had billions of dollars of wages stolen each year. Undocumented workers are especially impacted, with many fearing to report violations especially amid the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant policies.

Furthermore, workers continue to face discrimination, filing an average of 83,000 charges per year since 1997. Political attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion have only eroded the mechanisms designed to address these injustices.

The House budget proposal claims to champion efficiency, but true efficiency cannot be achieved by dismantling an already vulnerable labor protection ecosystem or by slashing public-sector resources. The chronic underfunding of worker protection agencies turns legally guaranteed protections into hollow promises and leaves workers exposed to unchecked exploitation and vulnerability. A budget that truly supports U.S. workers would pass robust funding for staffing, investigators, and programs that guarantee safety, fairness, and justice across every workplace.

A note about terminology

Topics covered in this FAQ often involve specialized uses of language, reflecting both legally defined concepts and/ or “terms of art” typically used by practitioners. For definitions of key terms, check out the glossary at the end of this report.

What is sectoral bargaining?

Sectoral bargaining is a form of collective bargaining in which one or more unions bargains with multiple employers to reach a legally binding agreement on common standards that then apply to all workplaces across a particular industry, sector, or region.

Sectoral bargaining has not traditionally been part of labor law frameworks in the U.S., but it is not a new concept and has historically been an effective model for setting wages and standards in various sectors across many European countries. The sectoral approach to collective bargaining offers a different approach from the traditional U.S. “firm/enterprise level” model of bargaining in which unionized workers in a single workplace bargain with their employer to set wages and working conditions.

What conditions are motivating growing interest in sectoral bargaining in the U.S.?

In recent years, interest has grown in the question of whether sectoral bargaining or sectoral approaches to setting wages and other standards might enable U.S. workers to combat declining union density and rebuild bargaining power necessary to raise wages and improve conditions across what has become a highly unequal economy. Calls for expanding sectoral strategies are typically motivated by recognition of two closely related trends:

• Growing numbers of workers who wish they had a union contract are facing obstacles to forming or joining a union under existing weak and outdated labor laws.
• Growing numbers of workers are experiencing low wages and poor working conditions in industries in which it is especially difficult to unionize—for example because they lack employee status, are highly dispersed and isolated, work for a franchise, are hired via temp or staffing agencies, or perform “gig work” assigned via a digital app.

The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA or Act)—the primary federal law establishing union rights in the private sector—has as its premise a lofty and admirable goal: “encouraging the practice and procedure of collective bargaining” between workers and their employers. Since the Act’s passage in 1935, millions of workers have won higher pay, better health care and retirement benefits, stronger health and safety protections on the job, and other important improvements through forming unions and using their collective strength to bargain with their employers. Historically, strong unions have helped ensure that income growth is distributed broadly and not just to the wealthiest households.

But the NLRA has been significantly weakened since its passage through a series of congressional and court actions, and today’s broken federal labor law is failing to live up to the NLRA’s originally stated goal. For example, data show a growing mismatch between the millions of workers who say they want a union and the relatively small number of workers who actually have one. Union membership in the U.S. ticked up slightly in 2025, breaking a decades-long trend of declining unionization. But today’s unionization rate of 11.2% is less than a third of what it was in the 1950s when union strength delivered broadly shared prosperity and a thriving middle class, and lower than in 1935 when the NLRA was first enacted.

One of the consequences of this decline in union strength in the U.S. is a corresponding decline in the ability of unions in a particular sector or industry to set broad wage and benefit standards covering a large percentage of workers in that sector or industry. When unions were stronger, they were able to align the structure of collective bargaining with the corporate structure in their industry and negotiate agreements with large employers that established wage standards for an entire industry. Union contracts established wages for unionized workers, and nonunion employers raised wages to stay competitive. In this manner, unions helped raise wages for all workers, both union and nonunion.

What does existing U.S. labor law say about sectoral bargaining? What kinds of sectoral bargaining are already possible under current labor laws?

U.S. labor law places some obstacles in front of workers and unions seeking to bargain broadly with multiple employers in their industry. Specifically, the National Labor Relations Act has long been interpreted as establishing a single worksite and a single employer as the default unit for bargaining. Workers and unions can try to win a broader bargaining unit, such as a multifacility bargaining unit of the same employer, but to do so, they need to persuade the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) of the appropriateness of the larger unit and organize support from a majority of employees in the bigger unit. 

Likewise, under current law workers and unions can propose but cannot insist that employers in their industry bargain together on a multiemployer basis with the union or a group of unions. Basically, workers and unions are limited in taking this multiemployer approach, even though when achievable, it enables coordinated bargaining within a sector or industry and prevents employers from pitting workers and unions at different locations against one another.

Still, even within constraints posed by existing U.S. labor law, there are many examples (both historical and contemporary) of unions using collective power to win and maintain bargaining agreements that cover workers beyond an individual workplace. Unions have achieved this through national agreements, through multiemployer bargaining, and through campaigns that use both policy changes and bargaining power to set standards for workers beyond those directly covered by a contract. Examples of these successes include union contracts that cover grocery workers across all major grocery chains in some regions, and the long-standing practice in the construction trades of multiple unions bargaining national, regional or local multiemployer master agreements with employer associations.

What policy changes would be necessary to achieve wide-scale, comprehensive sectoral bargaining in the U.S.?

Engaging employers and unions in comprehensive sectoral bargaining to set standards covering major industries across the U.S. would require federal legislative reform because the National Labor Relations Act, as currently interpreted, is too narrow and restrictive to facilitate sectoral bargaining. 

More modest changes to federal law could empower workers and unions to designate larger, multiemployer bargaining units for the purposes of collective bargaining, unless the employer can demonstrate a compelling reason why a broader unit is not workable. This would enable larger groups of workers and unions to pursue more sectoral approaches to bargaining in their industries. 

Even without major federal labor law reform, promising intermediate pathways to raising sectoral standards could include union-strategic organizing initiatives to increase union density in key industries and geographies. Many unions—even within the constraints of existing labor laws—have successfully used combinations of collective bargaining, organizing, and policy power to raise standards for groups of workers far beyond those they directly represent (see examples above). Under existing labor laws, unions can build toward forms of sectoral bargaining through organizing critical masses of workers in a particular industry or region, pursuing multiemployer collective bargaining agreements, and/or pursuing policy changes that effectively extend the wages and benefits unionized workers have won to other employers across an industry or region.

In addition, state and local governments have some limited legal authority to enact sectoral bargaining policies for workers who currently lack employee status under the National Labor Relations Act. Examples of such policies include state sectoral bargaining frameworks recently enacted to cover rideshare drivers in Massachusetts (2024) and California (2026) and similar legislation awaiting the governor’s signature in Illinois (see Appendix Table 1 for details on these policies). State and local governments also have broad latitude to pursue sectoral standard setting via wage/standards boards that, if well designed, can engage unions representing workers in key industries in the standard-setting process (see Appendix Table 2 for details on these state and local policies).

Other policy approaches to strengthening sectoral standards include expanding prevailing wage laws that apply to all employers receiving public contracts to perform work in a given industry or enacting sectoral minimum wage policies that raise the wage floor in a given industry.

What’s the difference between sectoral bargaining and a sectoral wage board or standards board?

Sectoral bargaining involves negotiations between one or more unions and a group of employers in a particular sector or industry to establish wages, benefits, and other working standards in the sector or industry. Beyond setting guidelines for the process, the government is typically not involved directly in the bargaining, though government may play a role in approving or implementing resulting agreements. 

In contrast, the government is heavily involved in sectoral wage boards or standards boards. Historically, wage boards in the U.S. context have typically brought together representatives of workers and employers to make recommendations to a government agency or legislative body on wages and other standards for their particular industry. Policymakers then consider the recommendations and potentially adopt them as standards that apply to all employers in the particular sector or industry. In some cases, wage/standards boards have authority to set certain standards more directly.

Unlike sectoral bargaining, wage boards have an established federal policy history in the U.S. For example, following the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) in 1938, the federal government established several “industry committees,” focused primarily on low-wage sectors like garment and textile manufacturing. For a short period these industry committees helped raise wage floors in many low-wage sectors (thereby improving conditions for union organizing among some groups of workers), until they were disbanded in the late 1940s as part of a political compromise to secure a federal minimum wage increase.

As detailed in Appendix Table 2, examples of new sectoral wage or standards boards created by state or local governments in the past decade reflect highly variable policy designs, but government roles are central in each of them. Because government plays such a key role in the adoption, implementation, and enforcement of sectoral standards developed by wage boards, this process is sometimes referred to as sectoral co-regulation, to more clearly distinguish it from traditional collective bargaining, which is a private negotiation process between employers and unions.

What roles do unions play in sectoral bargaining versus wage boards/standards boards? 

Sectoral bargaining is a form of collective bargaining. In sectoral bargaining, a union (or unions) representing workers from a given sector is at the bargaining table negotiating directly with a group of employers, and agreements reached by the parties cover all employers in the sector or industry. The sectoral agreement sets a uniform “floor” for standards across the industry, and the union then supplements these sectoral agreements via negotiations at the local workplace level in locations where workers are unionized. Unionized workers are directly represented in the bargaining process (at the sectoral and the local levels) and have the opportunity to shape bargaining priorities and outcomes via participation in the union’s internal democratic decision-making processes.

Union roles in sectoral co-regulation (by means of participation in a wage or workforce standards board) can vary, depending on how a particular board is designed, the political context in which a board operates, and the degree to which particular unions take initiative to engage with the board process and/or engage members in providing input to any union representatives serving on the board.

For example, one version of this process might be that a union representative appointed to a wage board (alongside other board members representing employers and government) takes part in the process of analyzing and recommending wage standards that the board then submits to a government agency for final review, approval, and implementation. Unlike the process of collective bargaining, union members are typically not directly involved in deciding who represents workers on a wage board or in approving the standards a wage board recommends.

Union representation on a wage board may be required as a matter of policy or left to the discretion of those with authority to appoint board members. In most cases, wage board members are appointed by a government official—typically a governor, a legislative leader, or labor agency leader—meaning the appointments are part of a political process and can change based on changes in elected or agency leadership. Wage boards generally specify a certain number of seats for worker and/or union representatives, and in most cases, some but not all unions in a sector or industry are represented on a given board. See Appendix Table 2 for recent examples of how state or local sectoral standards boards have been structured.

Does sectoral bargaining lead to increased union membership and more worker power? 

Where achievable, strong sectoral bargaining systems have some clear advantages over enterprise-level bargaining in rebalancing labor market power and potentially creating more favorable economic conditions for worker organizing. Sectoral agreements that set wages and workplace standards across an entire industry can curb the ability of individual employers to pit workers (as well as state and local governments) against each other in a race to the bottom on wages and standards. By removing wages and basic standards from competition, sectoral bargaining can in turn reduce anti-union hostility of employers who are otherwise inclined to take extreme steps to prevent workers from unionizing in order to suppress wages and benefits.

On other dimensions of worker power—including the ability of unions to build membership, engage workers in addressing concerns particular to their own workplaces, and maintain strong worker-led organizations capable of enforcing negotiated standards on the ground—firm/enterprise models of bargaining may have distinct advantages. Because negotiated sectoral standards apply whether or not a worker in the sector is a member of a union, under a sectoral agreement, large majorities of workers are likely to gain the financial benefits of coverage without contributing financially to the union and without opportunities to participate in union decision-making or organizing in their own workplace.

Because sectoral and enterprise/workplace approaches to collective bargaining differ in scope and scale and produce different (highly complementary) economic and institutional benefits, an ideal labor-policy framework would include mechanisms to facilitate both.

Significant worker organizing is likely a precondition for large-scale forms of sectoral bargaining to emerge as a successful policy option in the U.S. Sectoral bargaining requires the presence of a representative union to engage in the bargaining process with employers. Successful sectoral bargaining models require that unions possess and maintain some degree of political power, rooted in the ability to organize and represent a significant base of workers. When unions are unable to sustain organizational power and political influence, gains won via sectoral strategies can quickly be lost, and sectoral bargaining systems themselves can become fragile.

Does sectoral standard-setting via wage boards or standards boards lead to increased union membership and more worker power?

There is no inherently direct relationship between wage boards/standards boards and unions or the unionization process. So, the answer to this question depends on many factors, including how boards are designed, how much strength unions already have (or are able to build) in a particular sector or region, and how much capacity unions have to engage with a sectoral board and leverage new standards as part of union organizing initiatives (which are carried out independently outside of the board process). Available examples further illustrate that details of board design are critical to determining outcomes, including the degree to which effective sectoral standard-setting occurs, the degree to which unions are engaged in the standard-setting process, and whether the presence of sectoral standards can help decrease obstacles to union organizing.

While there is no automatic connection between establishment of a standards board and increased unionization, examples also suggest that well-designed standards boards can help create more favorable conditions for union organizing. The process of creating and participating in a wage/standards board can present opportunities for unions to increase communication with and the involvement of both existing members and nonunion workers in the affected sector who may be interested in unionizing. Likewise, in cases in which a board has authority to set and enforce a strong legally binding “floor” for wages and conditions across an industry, these standards can help decrease the incentive for low-road employers to engage in intense anti-union tactics to block worker organizing, since such employers can no longer maintain a competitive advantage based primarily on their ability to suppress wages and benefits. Unions’ roles in winning better wages and standards won via participation in an effective sectoral wage/standards board can in turn be publicized to nonunion workers and leveraged in union-organizing campaigns.

Whether a particular wage/standards board can achieve effective sectoral standard setting and contribute in this way to rebalancing labor market power depends on the details of its design and the engagement of strong unions in the standard-setting process. Newly established state and local boards reflect a wide array of approaches to policy design (see Appendix Table 2 for examples), including variations in how workers or unions are represented on boards and the scope of each board’s authority. For example, early evidence suggests that some new state boards, like Minnesota’s Nursing Home Workforce Standards Board, are achieving greater effectiveness due to certain policy design elements, such as an ability to hire dedicated staff, a clear process for state adoption of new standards, and mechanisms for worker-led enforcement of new standards (such as “know your rights” training).

Based on available state and local examples, factors most associated with a standards board leading to increased union density likely include:

• strong policy design that requires union representation on the board and gives the board clear authority and necessary resources to set, implement, and enforce standards
• presence of already strong unions, capable of effectively representing worker interests on the board and ensuring that the board carries out its intended mission
• the presence of strong unions in the industry with significant organizing capacity and commitment to a strategic organizing program focused on unionizing more workers in the industry

How is sectoral bargaining approached under new state laws covering rideshare drivers?

So far, the only sectoral bargaining policies in place in the U.S. are recently enacted state laws covering rideshare drivers in Massachusetts (2024) and California (2026). A similar law passed by the Illinois legislature is, as of publication, awaiting the governor’s signature. These laws create a state-administered system for facilitating sectoral bargaining between rideshare companies and a designated bargaining representative (union) for a single bargaining unit that includes all rideshare drivers in the state. The three new laws have some variations, but all include the following key features:

• requirements for all rideshare companies (Uber, Lyft, etc.) to regularly submit lists of drivers and their contact information to the state
• process for a certain threshold of rideshare drivers (5%–10%, depending on the policy) to indicate interest (i.e., by signing union cards) in having a particular organization (union) serve as a designated bargaining representative, thereby obligating the state to share driver contact lists with the union
• process for a certain threshold of drivers (25%–50%, depending on the policy) to petition (i.e., by signing union cards) the state for certification of their union, thereby obligating rideshare companies to then collectively bargain with the certified union
• rules and procedures for parties to follow in negotiations, including requirements for parties to submit negotiated agreements to the state for approval; if approved, the terms of the negotiated agreement then apply to all drivers in the state and to any company engaging rideshare drivers in the state

These laws are too new to have been fully tested, and the California and Illinois laws have not yet taken effect. In Massachusetts, the App Drivers Union (SEIU 34BJ/IAM) was certified as the exclusive union for all rideshare drivers in the state in May 2026, obligating rideshare companies to begin bargaining. See Appendix Table 1 for additional details on new state rideshare collective bargaining laws.

Appendix Table 1

What state or local governments maintain wage boards or standards boards, and how are unions involved in these structures?

A few states have maintained laws allowing for industry-specific wage boards since the early 20th century, and these statutes have attracted renewed interest in recent years. For example, in 2015 the New York Labor Commissioner used their authority under the state’s long-standing wage board statute to convene a wage board for the fast food industry, resulting in a new $15 minimum wage covering fast food workers statewide.

The state of California operated a sectoral wage and standards board for decades through its Industrial Welfare Commission (IWC, established in 1913), until the commission was defunded by the legislature in 2004 over concerns that it was being used by employer interests to undermine updated state wage and hour laws. The IWC was briefly revived with a new infusion of state funding in 2024 and issued new wage orders covering several sectors in 2025. When in operation, the IWC consists of a five-member board, including two labor representatives, two employer representatives, and one public representative (all appointed by the governor). The IWC has authority to issue orders governing wages, hours, and working conditions and must prioritize consideration of industries in which more than 10% of the workforce is at or below the federal poverty level.

In the past decade, renewed interest in sectoral standard setting has sparked additional state and local policy experimentation with wage and standards boards. New policies in a dozen state or local jurisdictions present a range of models for board structures that include some form of representation from workers (or unions), employers, and government officials who are tasked with studying, recommending, or in rare cases, directly setting wages and standards that affect conditions of workers in specified low-wage sectors.

Formal roles for unions in recently created state or local standards boards vary, as do the levels of authority each board has to recommend or set standards. Many boards were created with direct input from unions or emerged as legislative proposals in contexts in which unions were already organizing affected workers. New state and local experiments to date suggest that wage and standards boards are most likely to help increase worker power when boards have clear authority to set standards and where unions are actively organizing in the affected sector as new standards are issued. Implementation challenges faced by some new boards, such as California’s fast food council, also illustrate that strong commitment from government leaders is a necessary condition for a wage or standards board to function effectively, especially in the face of heavy industry opposition.

For more details on these policies, see Appendix Table 2. Additionally, legislation has been introduced to create new standards boards for nail salon workers in New York and long-term care workers in Oregon; Oregon also passed legislation in 2025 to study conditions of farmworkers, as a step toward considering a farmworker standards board.

Appendix Table 2

Glossary of key terms

Bargaining unit: The defined group of workers who are included (represented by a single union or bargaining representative) in the collective bargaining process and covered by any resulting contract agreements with an employer. If a union and employer do not agree on who should be included in a particular bargaining unit, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) determines the composition of the unit. A bargaining unit may include all or some of the workers in a given workplace; it can be very small and narrowly defined, or very broad, depending on what a group of unionizing workers prefers, what the employer will agree to, and whether workers can persuade the NLRB to recognize a “community of interest” among workers in the proposed bargaining unit. When workers attempt to form a new union, employers often file legal objections to workers’ preferred bargaining unit and use such disputes to delay the union representation and first-contract bargaining process.

Collective bargaining and collective bargaining agreement: Collective bargaining is a process by which a group of workers, through a designated bargaining representative(s), such as a union, negotiates with their employer(s) over wages, hours, and terms and conditions of employment. Though not required under U.S. labor law, collective bargaining can involve more than one union, and it can involve more than one employer, if the parties involved agree to this arrangement. Collective bargaining is a private process between the parties (although sometimes a federal or private mediator will be involved in assisting the parties in reaching an agreement). Agreements reached by the parties through their negotiations are memorialized in a “collective bargaining agreement,” which is a formal, legally binding contract between the parties.

Enterprise bargaining: Collective bargaining between workers, through their designated representative (union) and their employer, covering workers at a single facility. Enterprise bargaining is the default approach to bargaining under the National Labor Relations Act.

Multiemployer bargaining: Collective bargaining between one or more unions and a group of employers (typically operating through an employer association for their industry or a designated employer representative). Agreements reached by the parties in bargaining apply to all employers who have agreed to the multiemployer arrangement, but not to other employers (although they can agree later to be added to the agreement). Multiemployer bargaining is a voluntary arrangement—workers and unions cannot force an employer to bargain in this manner, as the NLRA does not legally require it. Multiemployer bargaining is, however, possible under current labor law and already commonplace in industries like construction, entertainment, and professional sports. Multiemployer bargaining can take place at the national, regional, or local level, depending on the structure of a particular industry and the preferences of the parties.

National agreement or master agreement: Unions and larger employers sometimes bargain a national agreement (sometimes referred to as a “master agreement”) that covers all unionized facilities of the employer, resulting in a collective bargaining agreement broader than the typical enterprise-level agreement. National agreements are effective at establishing uniform wage and benefit standards across an employer’s operations. These agreements are often supplemented at the local level by local agreements addressing particular issues at that location. Examples would include contracts negotiated between the United Auto Workers union and each of the “Big Three” automakers (Ford, GM, and Stellantis), between the Teamsters union and UPS, or between postal unions and the U.S. Postal Service.

Prevailing wage laws: Prevailing wage laws set a uniform minimum wage that employers must pay to workers on a project. Typically, prevailing wage laws apply to employers on government-funded projects to ensure that public investments support the creation of good jobs and do not drive down wages in the industry. Prevailing wage laws exist at the federal, state, and local levels and are a well-established means of setting strong wage standards across an industry that cover both unionized and nonunion workers.

Sectoral bargaining: Collective bargaining between one or more unions and a representative group of employers in a sector or industry to set wage and benefit standards for the sector or industry. Agreements reached by the parties apply to all employers in the sector or industry. There is currently no mechanism for sectoral bargaining in the National Labor Relations Act, but it is common in many European countries.

Sectoral co-regulation: Regulatory systems, such as wage boards or workforce standards boards, designed to facilitate setting of labor standards at the sectoral level with the participation of worker representatives and employers alongside public officials.

Tripartite: Tripartite refers to a process through which representatives of three parties— workers, employers, and the government—work to address an issue. Tripartite processes are a common feature of labor relations in many European countries. With the exception of a few state and local wage or standards boards, tripartite processes are rare in the U.S., and there is no formal mechanism for them to operate in the labor relations system under U.S. labor law. 

Wage board or standards board: Wage boards (sometimes also called worker(s) boards, labor standards boards, industry standards boards, industry councils, or workforce standards boards) are established by legislative or executive branch action in order to study, recommend, and/or set minimum standards for wages (and sometimes other working conditions) in a particular industry. Typically, such boards have a “tripartite” structure, meaning they include representatives of workers, employers, and government agencies as participating members. The structural design and effectiveness of such boards, including the degree of authority they have to set or implement standards, can vary widely (see Appendix Table 2 above for examples). Standard setting via a wage board process differs from traditional collective bargaining in that the government is involved in appointing members of the board and in approving and implementing any board recommendations on standards (unlike collective bargaining, which is a private process between unions and employers). Any standards resulting from a wage board process apply to all employers in the industry, whereas agreements reached through traditional collective bargaining apply only to the employer(s) involved in and are covered by the collective bargaining agreement. Because wage boards are essentially a government process with participation by workers and employers, they are sometimes referred to as “sectoral co-regulation.”

Works council: A works council is a committee of elected worker representatives that advocates for workers’ interests with their employer at the workplace level. Works councils are common in the labor relations systems of many European countries as an enterprise-level complement to industry or sectoral bargaining conducted by labor unions. This labor relations structure differs from the U.S. system, and works councils are generally not allowed under U.S. labor law, which prohibits employer domination, interference, or support of labor organizations (including works councils).

Key takeaways:

• So far this year, at least 13 states have introduced bills weakening child labor protections, and four have enacted them.
• Meanwhile, only three states have introduced bills to strengthen standards in 2026, compared with 15 in 2025.
• Industry-backed attacks on child labor standards have followed four troubling trends: 1) lowering minimum wages for teen workers; 2) weaponizing “youth apprenticeships”; 3) eliminating youth permits; and 4) weakening safeguards for teen child care workers.
• The Trump administration has undermined federal enforcement of child labor standards, even amid rising violations.
• Oregon enshrined current federal child labor standards into state law, offering a replicable model for states to hold the line against potential federal rollbacks.

Many state lawmakers took encouraging steps in 2023 and 2024 to strengthen their child labor standards—in response to high-profile reporting of widespread child labor violations across the U.S. and simultaneous efforts to weaken state child labor standards in the wake of COVID-19. But trends in 2026 suggest that this momentum may be waning despite continued increases in child labor violations. Meanwhile, opponents of strong child labor standards have continued to erode state standards and—in effect—chip away at the basis for federal standards, which have also come under threat.

In fiscal year 2025, more cases of federal child labor violations were uncovered than during any other year since the Great Recession, and hazardous work violations ticked up again after declining in the year prior (see Figure A). The rate of young worker deaths nearly doubled between 2020 and 2024, and at least one minor was killed on the job in the past year. At the same time, enforcement of federal child labor standards appears to have diminished under the Trump administration, which has proposed weakening existing standards. Since Trump was inaugurated in January 2025, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) has published news releases about only three child labor enforcement actions. In the last year of the Biden administration, WHD published news releases about 26 cases.

Figure A

Amid this growing child labor crisis, a few states are taking necessary action to shore up or strengthen standards, but in far too many states industry-backed attacks are continuing to succeed in rolling back child labor laws.

Oregon enshrined current federal standards into state law, a model other states can emulate

The 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) sets guidelines for the hours and nonhazardous jobs for which employers can hire minors. It sets a floor above which states can adopt and enforce their own stronger standards, but where state standards are weaker, federal law applies. Oregon, the only state to pass a bill strengthening child labor standards so far this year, enacted a law that enshrines into state law FLSA work hours for minors as of January 2026. Prior to the change, Oregon law followed federal hours guidelines for 14- and 15-year-olds,1 but had prevented the adoption of any state guidelines more restrictive than those in federal law (FLSA). The new law locks in current standards and guards against potential future erosion of federal standards, stipulating that Oregon’s minor work hours rules must be no less restrictive than FLSA standards as of January 1, 2026, and giving the state freedom to implement its own higher standards for minor work hours if needed in the future. Other states can propose legislation that enshrines federal child labor standards into state law and can go further by establishing standards that improve upon the existing federal floor.

Three other states proposed bills to strengthen existing standards

In 2026, Maryland, New Jersey, and New York lawmakers also made progress on bills to strengthen state child labor standards, but none have been enacted as of this publication. A 2025 New York bill mandating that minor workers receive information on their workplace rights in order to receive work authorization passed the Senate in March; a New Jersey bill proposes establishing minimum penalties and increasing penalties for certain child labor violations; and a Maryland bill establishing civil penalties and preventing the executive branch from seeking waivers from the FLSA passed the House but was not taken up by the Senate. The Maryland bill’s provision prohibiting FLSA waivers was likely a response to a proposal in Project 2025 that would allow states to opt out of certain FLSA provisions, which would erode workers’ right to federal minimum wage and overtime protections. Next year, lawmakers should recommit to advancing stronger state standards, especially given the distinct possibility that federal standards will come under threat.

Over a dozen state legislatures attempted to roll back child labor standards this year

So far in 2026, at least 13 states have introduced bills that weaken child labor protections, and four have enacted them (see Table 1). In contrast, only three states have introduced bills to strengthen child labor protections in 2026, and only one has enacted such legislation.2 For comparison, 15 states introduced bills to strengthen child labor standards in 2025.

Table 1

Proposals to erode existing standards this year included: weakening protections from hazardous work; implementing or expanding minimum wage exemptions for minors; extending the number of hours employers can schedule minors to work; eliminating the state’s youth employment documentation system; and lowering minimum age requirements for workers in child care centers (see Table 1). Four particularly troubling patterns have emerged in legislation attempting to weaken child labor standards across multiple states:

1. Attempts to lower the minimum wage for teen workers;
2. Attempts to use state legislation on “youth apprenticeship” or “work-based learning” programs as a vehicle for weakening state child labor standards;
3. Elimination of youth work permits or other systems that ensure the documentation of minor employment; and
4. Attempts to lower or remove safety standards and staffing ratios for teen workers in child care facilities.

Lawmakers continued to propose excluding teen workers from voter-approved state minimum wage increases

As in previous years, state lawmakers continued to advance proposals that would subject minor workers to lower minimum wages than adults, particularly in states where successful ballot measures recently increased the state minimum wage. Florida, Missouri, and Nebraska voters approved ballot measures in recent years that increased the state minimum wage to $15 an hour (Florida’s minimum wage will increase from $14 to $15 in September). Legislators in the same three states are now attempting to exclude minor workers from these higher minimum wages.

Florida lawmakers reintroduced a bill to allow minors in work-based learning programs to “opt out” of receiving the constitutionally-mandated state minimum wage; Missouri lawmakers proposed paying minors nearly $3 less than the state’s new $15 minimum wage; and Nebraska lawmakers successfully enacted a bill that increased the state’s temporary youth training wage but also implemented a permanent subminimum wage for 14- and 15-year-olds. Such proposals undermine the stated goals of lawmakers to boost youth employment, address the “labor shortage,” and allow teens to earn for their futures. Youth subminimum wages do not benefit young people and erode the wage floor, depressing wages for all workers—teens and adults alike.

States continued a troubling trend of using unregulated state “youth apprenticeship” programs to roll back child labor protections

As shown in Table 1, three states proposed bills to weaken hazardous work protections for minors enrolled in work-based learning programs, marking a continued trend of attempts to erode standards that ensure early career training programs provide valuable experiences and skills without unnecessarily exposing young people to hazards known to pose a high risk of illness, injury, or fatality.

In Pennsylvania, lawmakers proposed exempting minors enrolled in work-based learning programs from state child labor standards, except where such standards reflect federal law. In Virginia, lawmakers introduced legislation that would allow employers to set the standards for appropriate work in hazardous occupations, undermining existing state laws that require work-based learning programs to be accredited by the U.S. Department of Labor or state Board of Education. However, education advocates managed to neutralize the bill’s harms by removing that provision, limiting the scope of work-based learning programs to particular industries, and adding language requiring such programs to comply with federal laws prohibiting employers from exposing teens to hazardous work.

In West Virginia, lawmakers used their recently created “youth apprenticeship program” to further erode state child labor standards for all minor workers, exacerbating troubling conflicts between state and federal child labor law created by earlier state legislation. In 2024, West Virginia lawmakers established a new “youth apprenticeship program” (YAP) that appears to permit YAP-enrolled minors to be employed in any of the 17 hazardous occupations prohibited by federal law, even though federal law provides limited exemptions for apprentices and student learners for only seven of the 17 hazardous occupation orders. This year, lawmakers expanded the program by removing the requirement that hazardous work assigned to youth apprentices be “occasional and incidental” to their training. This guardrail, which originates in federal law, is meant to protect youth apprentices from being treated as adult workers in hazardous jobs and to ensure that they are assigned hazardous work very rarely and only when it is necessary to further their training.

As part of the same legislation, West Virginia lawmakers also removed from state code the list of hazardous occupations prohibited for minors under state law. As a result, working minors not covered by the FLSA will no longer have protection from being employed in the deadliest jobs, and if federal protections are unenforced or eroded as Trump’s Project 2025 agenda has threatened, all West Virginia minors working in these jobs would lack protection. Many states have their own list of state hazardous occupation orders, which may differ slightly from the federal list. Where state and federal standards differ, the more protective standard prevails. Removing the state’s list will both endanger young workers and create confusion for employers who may not realize they must still follow federal law in areas where state law has been eroded, leading to increased reputational risk and legal liability for the state’s businesses.

Several states have weakened restrictions on hazardous work while eliminating the state’s ability to identify and investigate child labor violations

The West Virginia playbook for rolling back state child labor laws represents a troubling pattern for lawmakers and advocates to continue to monitor and resist. In 2024, the state created a new work-based learning program that did not conform to federal law, then eliminated youth work permits (and replaced them with weaker age certificates, which have now also come under threat), and a year later further weakened the state’s hazardous work protections using their new work-based learning program as a vehicle.

In just the past three years, two other states—Indiana and Iowa—have both eliminated their systems for documenting youth employment while also weakening prohibitions on hazardous work for minors. In 2023, Iowa lawmakers eliminated youth work permits, weakened hazardous work protections for youth enrolled in “work-based learning” programs, and added new provisions allowing state agencies to “waive” restrictions on hazardous work that violated federal law, among a host of other changes.

And this year, Indiana lawmakers eliminated the state’s “youth employment system” for documenting minor employment after implementing the system to replace eliminated youth work permits in 2020. As a result, state agencies will have no record of teen employment—a change the legislature’s own fiscal analysts acknowledged will impede enforcement of child labor laws. Indiana’s 2026 rollback comes on the heels of numerous changes enacted in 2024 that extended work hours for minors, eliminated night work restrictions, weakened protections for hazardous work, and—though this provision was amended out of the final bill—proposed giving employers complete civil immunity for workplace fatalities of minors enrolled in work-based learning programs.

Recent research shows that youth work permits play an important role in preventing child labor violations by enhancing awareness of child labor standards, creating legal accountability, and aiding in enforcement. In 2024, Wisconsin lawmakers passed legislation eliminating work permits for minors under 16, but the governor vetoed the legislation and stated in his veto message that he objected to eliminating a process that protects youth from exploitation. This year, Wisconsin’s Department of Workforce Development uncovered more than 1,600 child labor violations by a single Burger King franchisee—the largest in the state’s history—including 593 work permit violations. Recent research has shown that states with work permit mandates have fewer child labor violations. Employers violating work permit rules are also often violating work hours and hazardous work protections.

Continued efforts to weaken protections for teen child care workers are part of a larger deregulatory agenda in the care industry

This year, for the third time since 2022, Iowa lawmakers proposed legislation to weaken standards related to teen supervision of children in child care facilities. In 2022, Iowa enacted a bill that lowered the minimum age for child care workers and increased the number of children facilities could place under the care of a single staff person. In 2024, lawmakers proposed allowing a 16-year-old to be charged with the care of four infants, seven toddlers, or 10 three-year-olds without direct supervision, but the bill failed. The bill was supported by the billionaire-founded right-wing dark money group Americans for Prosperity, which also lobbied in support of a 2023 Kansas bill to allow minors as young as 14 to care for young children and allow 16-year-olds to provide child care with no adult supervision.

In 2025, Iowa enacted additional changes through the administrative rulemaking process, allowing teenagers as young as 16 to care for children of any age in limited circumstances. And this year, lawmakers proposed allowing 15-year-olds to care for children without supervision. The 2026 Iowa bill received significant support from lobbyists representing The Family Leader and Family Leader Foundation, Iowa’s state affiliate of the Family Research Council, an anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion hate group.

Michigan also issued new administrative rules effective April 2026 that increased child-to-staff ratios and allow 16-year-olds to care for numerous young children without supervision—in both group and family child care homes.

The push to lower the minimum age for child care providers and increase child-to-staff ratios is part of a larger industry agenda to deregulate the care economy and avoid reckoning with its true costs. This agenda—which has also involved reducing the education and experience requirements necessary for provider licensing and even using state power to block stronger local standards—has strained providers, degraded the quality of care, and led to injuries and even deaths of young children in recent years. Placing the burden of responsibility of caring for young children on teenagers who are still themselves children harms everyone while sidestepping the real issues facing our child care system: insufficient public investment to make child care affordable and to pay providers adequately.

In an era of federal retrenchment and continued state rollbacks amid rising violations, more state lawmakers should seek to strengthen standards

Though the news media has largely moved on and federal enforcement attention appears to have waned, child labor violations remain a persistent issue and may be getting worse. Fiscal year 2025 saw more child labor cases generally and more minors employed in violation of hazardous occupation orders than any year in recent memory. While some states continued advancing legislation to strengthen child labor standards in 2026, and Oregon succeeded in enacting legislation to guard against federal rollbacks, far more states focused their efforts on weakening existing standards.

Given the very real risk that aspects of FLSA child labor protections could be eliminated (or will go unenforced), all states should at a minimum lock in existing FLSA standards and ensure state capacity to enforce them. Beyond this, states have critical opportunities and responsibilities to modernize child labor standards beyond the minimal, outdated FLSA floor to ensure that minors who must work or choose to work can access safe work experiences that don’t harm their health or education.

1. Maximum of 3 hours per day, 18 hours per week when school is in session; 8 hours per day, 40 hours per week when school is not in session. See: https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/state/child-labor

2. We exclude legislation related to child influencers. At least five states have introduced bills to increased protections for children featured in video content in 2026 (AZ, MD, MO, NJ, TN), and two states (NJ, TN) have enacted such legislation.

Key takeaways:

• The federal minimum wage is at its lowest real value in 77 years. Frozen at $7.25 since 2009, the federal minimum wage has lost 30% of its purchasing power during this 17-year freeze.
• Setting the federal minimum wage at two-thirds of the national median wage would raise pay for 39.6 million workers in 2030, about 1 in 4 of the wage-earning workforce.
• The policy would move the federal floor meaningfully toward one definition of a living wage, meeting EPI’s Family Budget Calculator thresholds in half of U.S. counties for a single adult working full time. But it falls short for many families, meaning that policies to strengthen unionization, provide a more robust safety net, and keep unemployment low remain essential.
• Decades of economic research support this two-thirds benchmark, finding little to no employment loss from ambitious minimum wage increases.
• Indexing the federal minimum wage to median wage growth would lock in these gains. Median wages typically outpace prices, so median wage indexing would prevent the kind of decades-long slide that has eroded the current floor.

Introduction

The federal minimum wage, frozen at $7.25 since 2009, is now at its lowest real value in 77 years and a major driver of the affordability crisis facing low-wage workers. For over a decade, the senior Democrats on the House and Senate’s labor committees have consistently introduced and championed the Raise the Wage Act, which would significantly raise the federal level (most recently, to $17 an hour in 2030) and index it to median wage growth going forward. But Congress as a whole has failed to take action on the legislation. In the absence of federal movement, states have moved on their own: Thanks in large part to the Fight for $15 campaign, 21 states and the District of Columbia, home to half of all U.S. wage earners, will have a minimum wage of at least $15 by 2028. But that patchwork still leaves 20 states—home to about 55 million workers—at $7.25, and updating the federal floor to a modern benchmark is the only way to reach these workers.

Raising the federal minimum wage to two-thirds of the national median wage would lift pay for nearly 40 million workers, about a quarter of the workforce. Two-thirds of the median—equivalent to roughly $17.70 today, a projected $20 in 2030, and a projected $25 in 2038—matches the benchmarks used in other high-income countries and tracks the direction of recent minimum wage research. Indexing to median wage growth thereafter would keep the floor from losing ground to inflation or falling behind the broader economy.

A federal minimum at two-thirds of the national median would eliminate poverty wages and move the floor meaningfully toward a living wage in much of the country: A single adult working full time could cover modest expenses in half of U.S. counties under EPI’s Family Budget Calculator thresholds. Maintaining the two-thirds minimum-to-median ratio would lock in those gains, improving affordability for U.S. workers and their families. It would also durably narrow the gap between low-wage workers and the typical worker, with Black workers and women seeing the largest benefits.

The two-thirds benchmark is also well-supported by economic research. Decades of studies of state and federal minimum wages find that higher floors raise pay for low-wage workers with little to no effect on employment, and a smaller but growing body of work on minimum wages approaching two-thirds of the median reaches the same conclusion. Setting the federal floor at two-thirds of the median, and updating it annually, would raise incomes at the bottom and prevent the kind of decades-long slide that has left the current minimum at its lowest real value in 77 years.

The outdated federal minimum wage and extent of low pay

The federal minimum wage is now at its lowest real value in 77 years. Stuck at $7.25 since 2009, it is in its longest stretch without an increase since the federal wage floor was established in 1938 (Figure A). Inflation has eroded 30% of its purchasing power over those 17 years, gradually cutting real pay for the lowest-wage workers in states still tied to the federal floor. Simply indexing the 2009 wage to inflation, a far weaker standard than this report proposes, would put the federal minimum at about $10.60 today.

The minimum wage was once meaningfully higher in real terms. Civil rights organizers in the late 1960s pressed Congress not only to raise the wage floor but also to extend its coverage to service industries that had previously been excluded because they disproportionately employed Black workers. By 1968, the federal minimum wage reached $1.60 per hour, equivalent to $12.62 in 2026 dollars and roughly 61% of the national median wage at the time, close to the two-thirds benchmark this report proposes. Even a federal minimum wage of $12.62 today would raise the wages of about 12 million workers.

Because Congress has not raised the federal floor in 17 years, states and localities have moved on their own. Thirty states, the District of Columbia, and dozens of cities and counties have raised their minimum wages, many in response to the Fight for $15 campaign (EPI 2026a). By the end of 2028, more than half of the U.S. workforce, about 74 million workers, will live in a state with a minimum wage of at least $15.

The state-by-state patchwork has delivered real successes but also left tens of millions of workers behind. Roughly 55 million people work in the 20 states still tied to the $7.25 federal floor, and they are nearly twice as likely as workers elsewhere to earn less than $15 per hour. Nationally, almost no one is paid exactly $7.25 anymore: The floor is so low it rarely binds. Yet 14 million workers, about 9% of the workforce, still earn less than $15. Closing that gap and preventing the federal floor from eroding further requires a national standard pegged to a modern benchmark.

A new standard: Two-thirds of the median wage

The federal minimum wage suffers from two related deficiencies: Its level is too low, and it does not adjust as the economy grows. Both can be solved by tying the federal minimum to two-thirds of the national median wage. Congress would first raise the floor to that level, and each subsequent year the minimum would adjust to maintain the same ratio.

First, the new benchmark replaces a poverty-level federal floor (Hickey and Cid-Martinez 2025) with one that pushes the minimum wage toward a living wage. As Oakford (2026) argues, two-thirds of the median is “a realistic stepping stone to living wages,” and standards below that ratio leave too large a gap between earnings and the cost of necessary expenses. A federal minimum at two-thirds of the median also better fulfills the original promise of the federal standard, which Congress described in 1937 as protecting “this Nation from the evils and dangers resulting from wages too low to buy the bare necessities of life” (U.S. Congress 1937).

Second, maintaining the two-thirds ratio guarantees automatic increases as the economy grows, ending the recurring erosion that comes from a frozen federal floor. Because median wages typically outpace prices, median wage indexing produces real gains, not just inflation protection. In 2025, two-thirds of the national median wage was $17.11 per hour (Figure B), and today, it is estimated to be $17.70. By 2030, applying Congressional Budget Office (2026) Employment Cost Index projections, it would reach $20.02. A federal minimum tied to two-thirds of the median would likely reach or exceed $25 by 2038, four years sooner than if a $17.11 wage in 2025 had been indexed only to the cost of living going forward.1

Nineteen states and the District of Columbia index their minimum wages to inflation, but Connecticut goes further by indexing to average wage growth and capturing the real gains that wage growth typically delivers above prices. Congress should follow Connecticut’s lead and link the federal minimum to the national median wage. Of course, indexing to price inflation would be an enormous improvement to current federal minimum wage policy and to state and local minimum wage policies that have also failed to implement automatic increases. Tying the minimum wage to median wages—i.e., indexing the minimum to typical workers’ wage growth—would yield even larger increases over time.

Tying the federal minimum to two-thirds of the median would also durably narrow inequality in the bottom half of the wage distribution. Whenever the minimum wage fails to keep pace with economy-wide wage growth, the gap between low and median earners widens. But a substantial increase in the minimum to a fixed ratio of the median shrinks and bounds that gap by construction. The gains disproportionately affect Black workers and women, who are overrepresented in low-wage jobs due to persistent racism and sexism (Banks 2019). Minimum wages are a major determinant of Black-white wage gaps (Derenoncourt and Montialoux 2020; Wursten and Reich 2023), and the long erosion of the federal minimum was a leading driver of widening pay inequality among women (Autor, Manning, and Smith 2016).

The state of minimum wage research and new policies

Minimum wages and job losses

A federal benchmark of two-thirds of the national median would significantly raise wages, and recent research strongly supports the conclusion that ambitious minimum wage targets work as intended, with little to no employment downsides. Across more than three decades of modern economic research, the median estimated employment effect is small; among studies that look at all low-wage workers rather than narrow subgroups, the effect is essentially zero (Zipperer 2024). The recurring scare stories about job losses are not borne out by the body of evidence.

Businesses adjust to higher minimum wages through what Dube (2026b) and Bernstein (2013) call the “Three P’s”: productivity, prices, and profits.2 Take productivity first. Higher wages reduce the rate at which workers quit, particularly in high-turnover sectors like restaurants and retail. That lowers hiring and training costs and means employment levels can hold steady even as new hiring slows. Better-paid workers, and workers with longer tenure, are also typically more productive, further offsetting the cost of the wage increase.

The minimum wage also redistributes income to low-wage workers when employers cover higher labor costs through reduced profits or modestly higher prices. Vergara (2026) and Coviello, Deserranno, and Persico (2022) both find that minimum wage increases shrink profits in low-wage industries. Price pass-through is small in aggregate terms because low-wage workers’ earnings are only a fraction of total labor costs, which are themselves a fraction of total business expenses. California’s $4 overnight increase in the fast-food minimum generated a one-time increase in fast-food prices of 2.1% to 3.6% (Sosinskiy and Reich 2026; Clemens et al. 2026). To put that in context: The price of a $6.00 hamburger would have risen to about $6.17.

How high is too high?

A common way to measure the level of a given minimum wage is to use the minimum-to-median wage ratio. Sometimes called the Kaitz index, the minimum-to-median wage ratio compares the minimum with the underlying distribution of wages by measuring the share of the typical wage that the floor reaches. This report proposes setting that ratio at about 67%. Most of the U.S. evidence base reflects periods when the ratio sat well below that level, because until recently, U.S. minimum wages were rarely considered high by today’s standards. But a growing body of recent research, together with recent state and local policies, has pushed the evidence into higher ratios—and the results are the same: There is substantial room for higher minimums without large employment losses.

Cengiz et al. (2019) found no negative employment effects at minimum-to-median ratios up to 59%. Dube and Lindner (2021), studying city-level minimum wages with ratios averaging 58% to 64%, found small and statistically insignificant effects. Godoy and Reich (2022) found no employment effect across localities with ratios ranging from 56% to 82%. And the 1968 federal minimum, which reached roughly 61% of the median,3 has been reexamined in two recent studies that likewise found small or no employment effects (Bailey, DiNardo, and Stuart 2021; Derenoncourt and Montialoux 2021).

The most direct evidence that the floor can go meaningfully higher comes from California’s $20 fast-food minimum wage. In April 2024, the state raised the wage for fast-food chain workers from $16 to $20, pushing the ratio of that minimum to the state’s median wage to about 74%, well above most U.S. precedents.4 One might worry that customers would substitute toward lower-priced independent restaurants exempt from the policy, generating job losses at the chains. The actual evidence shows otherwise. Despite the large wage increase, research finds little to no employment effect of the policy (Bivens and Zipperer 2026), and the median employment effect in Dube (2026a) is essentially zero. Evaluations of the UK minimum wage through 2019, when it reached nearly 60% of the median wage, also find small, statistically insignificant effects on the employment of low-wage workers (Giupponi et al. 2024).

A federal benchmark set at two-thirds of the national median will push some states above two-thirds of their own median wage. There is good reason to be optimistic about employment changes there as well. The studies above already span a wide range of Kaitz ratios, from the high 50s through the low 80s, and consistently find little or no employment effect. California’s $20 fast-food minimum extends this evidence to a 74% state-level ratio with essentially no employment losses, and only five states would have a minimum-to-median wage ratio above that threshold under the proposed federal benchmark. And while the minimum wage would be at a higher level relative to the state median in those states, it would still be less than a “living wage” for many families in those areas, as I discuss later.

Even if some employment loss does occur, that is not the right test of policy success. Low-wage labor markets are dominated by job-to-job churn, so reduced employment in response to a higher minimum typically shows up as longer gaps between jobs rather than workers permanently shut out of the labor market (Cooper, Mishel, and Zipperer 2018). On net, low-wage workers come out ahead in annual earnings when significantly higher hourly pay more than offsets a modest increase in unemployment.

Policymakers and organizers campaigning for minimum wage increases have considerable room to maneuver above the current federal floor before needing to worry about job losses. To assuage concerns about employment impacts, a federal proposal could be structured to limit annual increases of the federal minimum wage so that they never exceed two-thirds of the national median wage. States and localities, of course, can and should continue to push for higher minimum wages, as many will have higher median wages and costs of living than the national average.

Existing proposals and policies reaching two-thirds of the median

Some recent federal proposals already target or are consistent with the two-thirds benchmark. The recent Give America a Raise Act would raise the federal minimum to $20 by 2029, close to this report’s projection of two-thirds of the 2029 median wage ($19.44). The Living Wage for All Act names the two-thirds benchmark explicitly and locks in indexation in statute: “once the minimum wage equals two-thirds of the national median hourly wage, it shall thereafter be automatically adjusted each year to maintain that ratio.” The Bold Economic Program for America (Reich 2026) likewise proposes $20 by 2030, and Oakford (2026) embeds the two-thirds target in a broader portfolio that includes just cause protections and stronger wage theft enforcement.

The benchmark also aligns U.S. policy with international practice. The UK Low Pay Commission has targeted two-thirds of the median for the National Living Wage since 2024, and in the EU, 17 of 22 countries benchmark their statutory minimum wages to a ratio of the median or average wage. The 2022 European Union Minimum Wage Directive obligates member states to use “indicative reference values”—such as 60% of the gross median wage—to assess adequacy of their wage standards (Luebker and Schulten 2026).

Some of these international benchmarks may look numerically lower than two-thirds, but they are usually defined against a different denominator. Germany, for instance, benchmarks against the median wage of full-time workers. In the United States, the full-time median is about 10% higher than the overall median, so 60% of the full-time median is roughly equivalent to two-thirds of the overall median that this report proposes.

Implementing a minimum wage equal to two-thirds of the median wage

Any federal legislation will need a phase-in period, but it must specify two things: a clear path to the target and an explicit guarantee that automatic median wage indexing kicks in once the floor reaches two-thirds of the median.

Implementing the benchmark also requires choosing a wage source. Legislation should designate the Department of Labor (DOL)—which already publishes median wage estimates through the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS)—to publish the official median wage each year. DOL has two ready sources: OEWS, an establishment survey, and the Current Population Survey (CPS), the household survey already used to produce the unemployment rate, which collects detailed wage and hours data.

Each source has tradeoffs. The CPS is timelier, with wage data available at a one- to two-month lag, but smaller samples, the difficulty of computing hourly earnings for salaried workers, and respondents’ tendency to round wages all introduce noise. OEWS uses an established BLS hourly wage methodology and median wage calculation that may be less volatile, but it is published with a one-year lag and pools data from earlier, lower-wage years. DOL could pick one source or use a weighted average; recent data show only about a $1 difference between the two surveys.5 Either way, expanding resources at BLS and the Census Bureau would strengthen the underlying data and support further refinements to the methodology.

Once DOL has a baseline median, indexing requires projecting that median forward to the year the new minimum takes effect. The UK Low Pay Commission, which recommends a two-thirds median target to the UK government, offers a useful template: It estimates a midyear median wage by combining lagged historical data with timely indicators and short-run forecasts (Low Pay Commission 2024). A concrete schedule illustrates the approach. To set the minimum for January 1, 2030, DOL would announce the new wage on July 1, 2029, six months in advance, based on its best projection of the July 2030 median, the midyear point representative of the median wage workers will face on average throughout 2030. The projection would proceed in three steps: compute the 2028 median from CPS or OEWS data; roll it forward to early-to-mid-2029 using a combination of available data—like the Current Employment Statistics, the Consumer Price Index, and the Employment Cost Index (ECI); and then roll it forward one more year using short-run wage projections like those in the CBO Budget and Economic Outlook (2026).

National and state effects of a federal minimum wage at two-thirds of the median

To estimate the economic benefits of a federal minimum wage set at two-thirds of the median wage, I model how many low-wage workers would see higher pay under this policy. I assume the policy is phased in over five years, so that if it went into effect today, the federal minimum would reach two-thirds of the median in 2030 and then automatically adjust each year to maintain that ratio.

Concretely, I assume the federal minimum rises to $12 immediately in 2026 and then increases incrementally to $20 in 2030, which is about two-thirds of the projected national median wage.6 Legislation should build in a path adjustment if 2030 median wages come in higher or lower than projected.

I focus on the effects in 2030. I assume the same phase-in path and automatic indexing applies to the federal tipped minimum wage, which has been frozen at $2.13 per hour since 1991.7 Wages elsewhere are assumed to grow in line with CBO ECI projections from 2026 to 2030, and the model incorporates the effects of scheduled state-level minimum wage increases (see the appendix for details).

In 2030, a federal minimum wage equal to two-thirds of the national median would raise pay for 39.6 million workers, about 1 in 4 of the wage-earning workforce (Table 1).8 Annual earnings would rise substantially, and the gains would be largest for Black workers: A full-time, full-year Black worker affected by the increase would earn about $5,000 more per year, compared with $4,400 for all affected workers. In line with other minimum wage increases, women would gain more than men, with 31% of women seeing higher pay compared with 23% of men.

Adults ages 20 and over would make up 9 in 10 affected workers (teens would have the largest share of affected workers of any age group, but they make up a small share of total employment). The problem of low pay is far from limited to the youngest workers.

Although several states with scheduled minimum wage increases will see the gap between their minimum wage and the new federal floor shrink, workers in every state would still be affected (Figure C). With the exception of D.C., no state’s scheduled 2030 minimum wage reaches $20. The largest gains go to workers in the 20 states still tied to $7.25: 1 in 3 (33%) would see a raise, and annual pay for those affected would rise by about $6,200 on a full-time, full-year basis.

Figure C

Beyond who gets a raise and how much, a related question is whether the raise is enough to cover a family’s basic costs. Setting a target of two-thirds of the median would push the federal floor much closer to a living wage for many families. What counts as a living wage varies across the country, depending on local costs and on family size and composition. EPI’s Family Budget Calculator thresholds make this concrete: They calculate the income a given family type needs in a given place to afford a “modest but adequate” standard of living. For example, in 2025 a two-adult, one-child family in Los Angeles County, California, needed about $118,000 in annual pretax earnings to pay for housing, food, child care, transportation, health care, taxes, and other necessities. In more rural Early County, Georgia, a similar family needed about $74,000. These budgets are minimal by design, with no allowance for savings, emergencies, retirement, college, or entertainment.

Of course, other business income and government provided social benefits can lower the amount of labor market earnings a family needs to maintain the same standard of living. Gould, Mokhiber, and deCourcy (2024) report that, according to Congressional Budget Office data, about 81% of a middle-income family’s budget is met by labor market income.

Applying that 81% adjustment to EPI’s Family Budget Calculator thresholds gives a more useful benchmark for what wages need to deliver. Under this adjusted measure, the Los Angeles County family would have needed about $96,000 in earnings to meet their 2025 budget, equivalent to both adults working full time, year round at about $23 per hour. The Early County family would have needed about $60,000, equivalent to both adults working full time, year round at $15 per hour.

The implications for everyday affordability are significant. After inflating these adjusted thresholds to 2030 dollars using CBO Consumer Price Index projections, a federal minimum at two-thirds of the median substantially closes the gap between full-time annual earnings and necessary expenses for low-wage workers and their families. A single adult working full time at the 2030 minimum of $20 would cover modest but adequate expenses in half of U.S. counties. Two full-time working parents with two children would meet their family budget in roughly a quarter of U.S. counties. Using similar thresholds, Oakford (2026) finds that a federal minimum at two-thirds of the national median in 2025 would be “90% to 99% of the median living wage of a single adult without children in 16 states.”

A federal minimum tied to two-thirds of the national median would therefore make enormous progress in increasing affordability and helping families make ends meet. Closing the remaining gaps will require a broader set of policies, including strengthening other labor standards like overtime protections and their enforcement, a more robust safety net, expanded public goods like universal health insurance, fewer barriers to unionization, and a renewed commitment to full employment.

Conclusion

The federal minimum wage is at its lowest real value in 77 years, and tens of millions of low-wage workers are paying for that erosion every paycheck. Pegging the federal floor to two-thirds of the national median wage, and maintaining that ratio, would correct the two flaws that have left the floor unfit for purpose: a level too low to function as a meaningful wage standard and a structure that does not adjust as the economy grows.

A federal minimum at two-thirds of the median would raise pay for nearly 40 million workers in 2030, deliver the largest gains to Black workers and to women, and bring the floor close to a living wage in much of the country. Decades of research, recent state and local experience, and California’s $20 fast-food minimum all point to the same conclusion: The labor market can absorb minimum wages of this size with little to no employment cost. The benchmark also brings U.S. policy into line with the UK and most of the EU, where two-thirds-style targets are now standard practice.

A higher floor cannot, on its own, guarantee economic security for working people. That will require a broader agenda: a stronger safety net, expanded public goods, fewer barriers to unionization, and a renewed commitment to full employment. But updating the federal minimum to a modern, indexed benchmark is the single most direct step Congress can take to raise wages at the bottom, and the only step that reaches the 55 million workers in the 20 states still stuck at $7.25.

Appendix

State benefits

Methodology

Underlying wages are based on the 2025 Current Population Survey and between 2025 and 2030. I assume wages increase at the rate of CBO (2026a) ECI projections and because of future state-level minimum wages. Due to the Trump administration’s immigration policies and the possibility of continued labor market weakening, how the baseline level of employment grows over the next five years is very uncertain. For simplicity, I hold the estimated employment level constant between 2025 and 2030 instead of making additional assumptions about either employment rates or population growth. In terms of total population growth, this assumption may not be too far off the mark of current projections; CBO (2026b), for example, estimates that between 2025 and 2030, the civilian population ages 16 to 64 will only grow by 0.06%, or 130,000 people.

Affected workers include those “directly” affected, whose wages would otherwise be less than the new federal minimum wage, as well as “indirectly” affected workers who earn up to 115% of the new minimum (Cooper, Mokhiber, and Zipperer 2019). These particular estimates may overstate the number of workers affected because while they incorporate already scheduled state-level increases, they exclude city-level minimum wage increases, and some cities will have higher than $20 minimum wage standards in 2030. On the other hand, if the labor market continues to weaken, low-wage workers will, in the absence of minimum wages, face slower than usual wage growth because their wage growth slows disproportionately when unemployment is higher (Bivens and Zipperer 2018).

Notes

1. These projections follow CBO ECI and CPI projections from 2025–2036, and for subsequent years assume 2026–2035 annual growth rates of 2.26% for CPI and 2.94% for ECI. 

2. For additional discussion, see Dube and Lindner (2025), Schmitt (2013), and Zipperer (2023).

3. OECD (2026) estimated the U.S. minimum-to-median wage for full-time workers was 55.05% in 1968. Assuming a 10% premium for the full-time median wage relative to the overall median wage results in a minimum-to-median wage ratio of 60.56%.

4. In April 2024, the state raised the wage for fast-food chain workers from $16 to $20, pushing the ratio of that minimum to the state’s median wage to about 74%, well above most U.S. precedents.

5. The 2024 OEWS national median wage (which is the latest available data) was $23.80 (BLS 2025). The EPI State of Working America Data Library (EPI 2026b), which uses CPS wage data and which we use for wage levels throughout this paper, reports a 2024 median wage of $24.87.

6. The exact schedule simulated below is $12 in 2026, $13.50 in 2027, $15.50 in 2028, $17.50 in 2029, and $20 in 2030.

7. Ideally other subminimum wages would be phased out, including those for some workers with disabilities and youth workers. I do not model the effects of those changes due to data constraints.

8. I concentrate on the effects in 2030. Were low-wage workers’ wages to grow slower (or faster) than median wages, these estimates would understate (or overstate) the effects in later years.

References

Banks, Nina. 2019. “Black Women’s Labor Market History Reveals Deep-Seated Race and Gender Discrimination.” Working Economics Blog (Economic Policy Institute), February 19, 2019.

Bernstein, Jared. 2013. “If Increasing the Minimum Wage Doesn’t Cost Jobs, How Does It Get Absorbed?” Huffington Post, August 14, 2013.

Bivens, Josh, and Ben Zipperer. 2018. The Importance of Locking in Full Employment for the Long Haul. Economic Policy Institute, August 2018.

Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). 2025. “Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) Tables, May 2024” [Excel file], Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics. Accessed May 13, 2026. 

Clemens, Jeffrey, Olivia Eduwards, Jonathan Meer, and Joshua D. Nguyen. 2026. “The Effects of Calfornia’s $20 Fast Food Minimum Wage on Prices.” National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper no. 34990, March 2026.

Congressional Budget Office (CBO). 2026a. The Budget and Economic Outlook: 2026 to 2036. February 11, 2026.

Congressional Budget Office (CBO). 2026b. The Demographic Outlook: 2026 to 2056. January 7, 2026.

Cooper, David, Zane Mokhiber, and Ben Zipperer. 2019. Minimum Wage Simulation Model Technical Methodology. Economic Policy Institute, February 2019. 

Coviello, Decio, Erika Deserranno, and Nicola Persico. 2022. “Minimum Wage and Individual Worker Productivity: Evidence from a Large US Retailer.” Journal of Political Economy 130, no. 9: 2315–2360.

Derenoncourt, Ellora, and Claire Montialoux. 2021. “Minimum Wages and Racial Inequality.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 136, no. 1 (February): 169–228.

Dube, Arindrajit. 2026a. “Labor Market Effects of California’s $20 Fast-Food Minimum Wage.” National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper no. 35171, May 2026.

Dube, Arindrajit. 2026b. The Wage Standard: What’s Wrong in the Labor Market and How to Fix It. New York: Penguin Random House.

Dube, Arindrajit, and Attila S. Lindner. 2024. “Minimum Wages in the 21st Century.” In Handbook of Labor Economics, Volume 5, edited by Christian Dustmann and Thomas Lemieux. 

Economic Policy Institute (EPI). 2026a. Minimum Wage Tracker. Accessed May 5, 2026.

Economic Policy Institute (EPI). 2026b. State of Working America Data Library. Accessed May 5, 2026. 

Giupponi, Giulia, Robert Joyce, Attila Lindner, Tom Waters, Thomas Wernham, and Xiaowei Xu. 2024. “The Employment and Distributional Impacts of Nationwide Minimum Wage Changes.” Journal of Labor Economics 42, no. S1: S293–S333.

Hickey, Sebastian, and Ismael Cid-Martinez. 2025. “The Federal Minimum Wage is Officially a Poverty Wage in 2025.” Working Economics Blog (Economic Policy Institute), April 28, 2025.

Low Pay Commission. 2024. “What Will the Minimum Wage Be Next Year?” (blog post). April 19, 2024.

Oakford, Patrick. 2026. Federal Employment Standards as the Foundation of Economic Security: Revisiting Minimum Wage, Just Cause, and Tools to Combat Wage Theft. Roosevelt Institute, May 2026.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). 2026. OECD Data Explorer. Accessed May 5, 2026.

Reich, Michael. 2026. The Unexpected Effects of a $20 Federal Minimum Wage. Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics, February 2026.

Reich, Michael, and Denis Sosinskiy. 2026. “Effects of a $20 Minimum Wage: Evidence from Granular Data on Wages, Employment, and Prices.” Institute for Research on Labor and Employment Working Paper, April 1, 2026.

U.S. Congress. Senate. Committee on Education and Labor. 1937. Fair Labor Standards Act of 1937. S. Rep. No. 884, 75th Cong., 1st Sess. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.

Wursten, Jesse, and Michael Reich. 2023. “Racial Inequality in Frictional Labor Markets: Evidence from Minimum Wages.” Labour Economics 82, 102344.

Related: Why the U.S. needs a $17 minimum wage • Why eliminate the tipped minimum wage

Interactive

February 26, 2026

Good afternoon, Chair Ricks, Vice Chair Camacho, and members of the committee,

My name is Nina Mast, and I’m a policy and economic analyst at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). EPI is a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank founded in 1986 to research the economic status of working America and propose public policies that protect and improve conditions for low- and middle-wage workers.

I’m here today to testify in support of HB 1054, a bill to strengthen Colorado workers’ right to a safe workplace. HB 1054 represents an opportunity for Colorado to continue showing leadership in efforts to protect all workers—both adults and minors—from preventable workplace injuries or fatalities.

As a national expert on state labor standards—including state standards to prevent young workers from exposure to hazardous occupations—I have had the opportunity to work on many state-level efforts to improve state workplace laws—including in Colorado. I regularly encourage policymakers to look to Colorado as a leader in making crucial and innovative updates to its standards both through legislation and administrative rulemaking. HB 1054 is an important next step for Colorado to take in this direction at a time when long-standing federal workplace health and safety standards are at risk.

Since the 1970 passage of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act first established basic nationwide workplace health and safety standards, OSHA has saved tens of thousands of lives and prevented millions of injuries. Unfortunately, federal OSHA today faces numerous threats including diminished enforcement capacity, efforts to block important and long-overdue new worker protection standards, and—notably—efforts to weaken the statute’s general duty clause, which ensures foundational safety protections to all workers, regardless of the occupation or industry they work in. The Trump administration has proposed carving entire industries out of coverage under the “general duty” clause. This disastrous proposal could leave many workers without any federally guaranteed right to protection from known and preventable workplace hazards.

Given the inadequacies of current federal OSHA enforcement and the risk that existing minimum federal standards could soon be eroded further, it’s crucial for states to step in to protect their workers.

HB 1054 not only enshrines the long-standing intention of the general duty clause into state law, but it also goes further to ensure stronger protections from workplace illnesses and injuries for Colorado workers today. Specifically, the bill creates a general duty of employers to provide “reasonable and adequate” protections for all workers and comply with all standards adopted through administrative rulemaking. The bill also empowers the state attorney general and the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE) to refer cases for investigation and recover penalties to be used for enforcement. And—importantly—it provides labor organizations and individuals harmed on the job with the option to file civil actions and pursue statutory damages in cases in which employers violate legal obligations to provide a safe workplace. These provisions will strengthen enforcement of the law, encourage reporting of unsafe working conditions by workers who report abuse at great personal risk, and more meaningfully deter violations.

As a national organization that convenes a network of state research and policy organizations, we have been closely tracking the implications of federal actions for workers at the state level. In the past year, OSHA has faced unprecedented threats to its enforcement capabilities, and aggressive immigration enforcement will make workers even less likely to feel safe reporting unsafe conditions at work. Because of these threats, state lawmakers have an opportunity and responsibility to resist the erosion of hard-won worker protections and take up the mantle of advancing workers’ right to a safe workplace. The sponsors of this bill have shown that they take this commitment seriously, and we urge all members of this committee and the Colorado General Assembly to do the same by supporting the passage of HB 1054.

Thank you.

This FAQ answers key questions about the “no tax on overtime” policy and what it means for working people.

Amid increased child labor violations, youth work permit systems have been under attack in some states

In recent years, child labor violations have been on the rise across the country. At the same time, lawmakers in many states have proposed bills to reverse long-standing state child labor standards that prohibit employers from exposing youth under 18 to hazardous jobs or overly long work hours that interfere with their health and well-being. Youth work permits—which many states have historically required—have been a repeated target of this coordinated, industry-backed campaign to weaken child labor laws. Such permits typically require employers to outline the potential hours and work duties for a minor worker, as well as parental approval and verification that the minor is attending school.

Since 2021, lawmakers in at least nine states have proposed weakening or eliminating youth work permit systems, and four have enacted such legislation (Alabama, Arkansas, Iowa, and West Virginia). Most recently, in 2025, Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy encouraged the legislature to pass a bill that would have eliminated the requirement that minors receive individual authorization to work (and replaced it with a general authorization for employers to hire minors). And in West Virginia, lawmakers successfully eliminated youth work permits for 14- and 15-year-olds and replaced them with age certificates following a two-year push by the right-wing think tank Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA). FGA has played a leading role in efforts to eliminate youth work permits in Arkansas, Iowa, Missouri, and Wisconsin.

New research explains how and why youth work permits are so effective

Proponents of eliminating youth work permits have often argued that work permits are not necessary, are overly burdensome for employers, or that they infringe on parents’ right to decide whether, where, and how long their child should work. In reality, work permits are a proven, effective policy for ensuring that young teens can enter the workforce safely by making sure employers are aware of child labor laws and that parents are fully informed about the conditions of a proposed job.

A year ago, we reported on research providing new quantitative evidence that work permits help prevent federal child labor violations. Using comprehensive data from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division from 2008 to 2020, researchers at the University of Maryland and Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, found that states requiring employment certificates saw 13.3% fewer violation cases and 31.8% fewer minors involved in these violations.1 States with work permits also saw 34.9% lower civil penalties per minor, indicating reduced severity of violations that do occur.

New findings from the same research team now reveal two key mechanisms that explain how work permits provide this protection: 1) work permits create a documentary paper trail that increases employers’ accountability and aids government enforcers, and 2) work permits improve compliance with state and federal standards by increasing employers’ awareness of child labor laws. According to the new analysis, requiring verification of parental consent for a minor to work and providing education to employers about hours restrictions are the main features that make work permits effective. State lawmakers can use the new findings to strengthen and modernize their youth work permit systems, using strategies proven to reduce violations and protect youth well-being.

Work permits create legal accountability and enable effective enforcement

Researchers found that work permits enable more effective enforcement of child labor standards by creating a record that employers were informed of child labor standards, therefore making it harder for employers to claim ignorance if violations occur. By analyzing publicly available federal court records, researchers found that in states with work permit mandates, 91% of child labor cases were classified as “willful” or “repeated” violations. These more serious classifications carry higher penalties. In contrast, only 33% of cases in states without work permit mandates received these classifications.

This finding implies that when employers hiring teens must complete a work permit that documents the minor’s age, obtains parental consent, and acknowledges legal requirements, they are made aware of child labor standards and can fully comply with state and federal laws. Work permits also enhance the investigatory capacity of federal enforcement agencies by providing basic documentation about youth employment that investigators can scrutinize when they suspect violations of federal law, as well as bolstering their ability to take effective action if an employer violates the law despite having been informed.

Work permits enhance awareness of specific child labor standards

Second, researchers found that work permits enhance awareness and monitoring of employers’ compliance with federal and state laws—but only for standards that are explicitly mentioned in the permitting process. Analyzing all relevant Department of Labor news releases detailing specific violations (118 in total) from 2020 through 2025, researchers found that work permits reduce precisely the types of violations that the permit forms explicitly warn employers are prohibited under federal law. As Figure A highlights, states with work permits showed: 1) fewer hours violations—minors working beyond federally permitted hours (e.g., federal law limits 14–15 year-olds to 18 hours per week during school weeks); 2) fewer age-limit violations—employment of children below minimum working age (typically 14 for nonagricultural work); and 3) fewer recordkeeping violations—failure to maintain required documentation such as age verification. On the other hand, hazardous occupation violations remained similar across both types of states. Analysis of employment certificate forms from all 38 states with mandates reveals why: While 100% mention age requirements and 60% mention work hours restrictions, most forms do not enumerate the specific hazardous occupations prohibited under federal law.

Figure A

Parental consent and hour limits provide strongest protection

The researchers also examined which features make permits most effective. Figure B highlights the findings. Examining employment certificate forms from 37 of the 38 states that require them (Mississippi’s form was not publicly available), researchers found that parental consent requirements had the strongest protective effect, reducing violations by 13.9% and case severity by 38.7% (measured by civil penalties assessed). Work hours documentation—in which the certificate must record the minor’s planned work schedule (typically completed by employers, though responsibilities vary by state)—also proved effective, reducing the number of minors involved in violations by 24.0%. In contrast, more passive requirements, such as employer signatures and job description requirements, showed lesser independent effects. This suggests that active oversight mechanisms, particularly parental involvement and explicit requirements to record work schedules to show compliance with legal guidelines on hours of work, drive the protective benefits. That these two features are particularly impactful provides further evidence that requiring employer documentation on work permits and verifying parental consent make work permits effective.

Figure B

Work permits prevent violations. State lawmakers should strengthen, not eliminate them.

Understanding how work permits prevent violations points to ways for states to further increase their effectiveness. The researchers identified four best practices lawmakers should consider:

• Strengthen parental consent requirements: Youth work permit applications should require parental signature and include a process for parents to revoke their consent in the future. 
• Strengthen requirements to outline the specific duties of the potential job: Youth work permit applications should require employers to document specific duties of the potential job and include the minor’s planned work schedule. 
• Include information about hazardous occupation restrictions on permit forms: Youth work permit applications should include a list of prohibited jobs for minors under state and federal law and affirm the employer’s commitment not to employ a minor for hazardous tasks and occupations.
• Clearly state hour limits: Youth work permit applications should include permitted daily and weekly hours and prohibitions on overnight work under both state and federal law. These forms should also clearly state that, where there are discrepancies between state and federal law, the more protective law applies.

These new insights into how youth work permits function reinforce the researchers’ original conclusion: Youth work permits are a proven method for reducing child labor violations. And they show that the permitting process can be a highly effective vehicle for educating employers, teen workers, and parents about legal rights and protections. States with existing work permit systems can strengthen them to enhance their protective effects—as Illinois, Michigan, and Washington have done—and states that do not have work permit requirements should take immediate steps to implement or reinstate them.

1. Throughout this report, the terms “work permits” and “employment certificates” are used interchangeably. Age certificates are distinct and more limited; they typically verify age but do not include the same safeguards.

Amanda Wood Laihow
Assistant Secretary for Occupational Safety and Health
U.S. Department of Labor 200 Constitution Ave., N.W.
Washington, DC 20210

Comments on RIN 1218-AD71: Interpretation of the General Duty Clause: Limitation for Inherently Risky Professional Activities

Dear Acting Assistant Secretary Laihow,

The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) submits these comments to oppose the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking “Interpretation of the General Duty Clause: Limitation for Inherently Risky Professional Activities.” We strongly oppose limiting the scope of the general duty clause, which protects workers from known and preventable dangers where no other specific standard applies. We oppose the deregulation of this critical protection that holds an essential role in maintaining safe and healthy work environments and urge the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to withdraw this proposed rule.

The Economic Policy Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank created in 1986 to include the needs of low- and middle-income workers in economic policy discussions. EPI conducts research and analysis on the economic status of working America, proposes public policies that protect and improve the economic conditions of low- and middle-income workers, and assesses policies with respect to how well they further those goals. For years, EPI has conducted research on the importance of strong labor standards, including health and safety standards. 

The proposed rule would exclude certain occupations that are deemed “inherently risky professional activities” from the general duty clause. The general duty clause is an essential component to the Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act by filling the gap for known and preventable dangers that do not have existing standards. The proposed carveout will result in a significant increase in preventable injuries among workers and a decrease in employer accountability. In OSHA’s own estimates, at least 115,000 workers from arts, entertainment and sports occupations would be affected by the proposed rule. However, the rule also solicits commenters to provide additional industries for exclusion, which may result in a rippling effect of excluding all industries with higher safety risks, where the OSH Act’s protections are most vital.1

Exclusion from the general duty clause means these workers would no longer be protected from known and preventable hazards that do not already have an existing standard. For example, while OSHA is undergoing a rulemaking on whether a federal heat standard should be established, there currently is no federal heat standard in place for workers. Therefore, the general duty clause is the only avenue for workers to be protected from extreme heat. There are a multitude of other health and safety risks that do not have OSHA standards, including protections against infectious diseases, ergonomic strains, and workplace violence.

Furthermore, at the time of this rulemaking, the Department of Labor has proposed amending or eliminating dozens of regulations that are designed to ensure workers have safe workplaces.2 This includes regulations that require employers to limit workers’ exposure to a variety of harmful substances (such as benzene, asbestos, lead, and cotton dust), regulations that require medical evaluations of respirators, and regulations that require color-coding to mark hazards.3 If the Department of Labor’s deregulatory agenda is finalized, workers will be less protected from known and preventable hazards.

The general duty clause is an essential component to the OSH Act that helps mitigate health and safety risks that we do not have existing standards for. Employers in higher-risk industries have already adjusted to providing these basic protections since the OSH Act was passed in 1970, and there is no indication that the general duty clause generates an unstainable burden on employers. For these reasons, EPI opposes the proposed rule and strongly urges OSHA to withdraw this rulemaking.

Sincerely,

Margaret Poydock
Senior Policy Analyst
Economic Policy Institute

Endnotes

1. 90 Fed. Reg. 28372.

2. U.S. Department of Labor, “Secretary Chavez-Deremer Unveils Aggressive Deregulatory Efforts in Push to Put the American Worker First” (press release), July 1, 2025.

3. Occupational Safety and Health Administration, “Deregulatory Rulemaking” (web page), accessed on October 30, 2025.