On the recordApril 28, 2014
I rise today to express my strong support for the nomination of Dr. David Weil to serve as Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division at the Department of Labor. The Wage and Hour Division oversees some of the most fundamental protections for American workers: it ensures that people are paid fairly in accordance with our minimum wage and overtime laws. It protects vulnerable children when our child labor laws are abused. It ensures that workers can spend time with their families when a new baby is born or a health crisis is looming. In short, this relatively unknown agency plays a huge role in how Americans experience their day- to-day working lives. However despite this important mission, this critical agency was unfortunately allowed to atrophy during the last administration. The division took a backseat approach that relied almost exclusively on complaint-driven enforcement--relying on the questionable assumption that vulnerable workers know their rights and will approach the agency to report violations of the law--rather than taking a more proactive approach to educate workers and seek out industries and populations where abuses are likely to happen. Furthermore, even this complaint- driven system was often poorly managed--the Government Accountability Office issued a harshly critical report finding that Wage and Hour ``frequently responded inadequately'' to those complaints that it did receive.…
