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Statement

‘Workers in America Deserve Fair Pay, Transparency’

February 1, 2018
Workplace Justice

Lisa Lederer, 202-371-1996

Statement from Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, executive director and CEO of MomsRising, a national online and on-the-ground organization of more than 1 million mothers and their families, on the revelation that the U.S. Department of Labor concealed a study showing the harm a proposed Trump administration rule would have on tipped workers
“Today, we learned that the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) concealed an economic analysis – paid for with taxpayer dollars – that showed its controversial proposed rule to allow employers to withhold their employees’ tips would likely cost workers billions of dollars. It is already deplorable that the Trump administration would put such a rule in place; it adds insult to injury that the DOL would attempt to hide this unfavorable study in order to lie to the public about the rule’s impact.
 
“The DOL proposal would allow employers to collect their workers’ tips and use them to enrich themselves, depriving minimum wage employees of their hard-earned tips. This rule, like the Republican tax law and so much of the Trump agenda, is designed to redistribute wealth from the bottom to the top. Minimum wage workers are already criminally underpaid – to allow employers to pocket their tips could rob them of more than half of their scant take-home pay. As is so often the case, this rule would disproportionately harm women and mothers – who make up nearly two-thirds of tipped workers – and hurt women and mothers of color even more.
 
“Workers in America deserve fair pay and transparency, and we all deserve an administration that serves our interests, not the interests of wealthy hotel and restaurant chain owners. We demand that the Trump administration withdraw this rule immediately, and that the DOL conduct itself with integrity and honesty rather than resorting to lies and deception. This is an outrage.”
 

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MomsRising.org is an on-the-ground and online grassroots organization of more than a million people who are working to increase family economic security, decrease discrimination against women and moms, and to build a nation where businesses and families can thrive. Established in 2006, MomsRising and its members are organizing and speaking out to improve public policy and to change the national dialogue on issues that are critically important to America’s families, including criminal justice reform, immigration policy reform, and gun safety. MomsRising is working for paid family and medical leave, affordable, high quality childcare and early learning, and for an end to the wage and hiring discrimination which penalizes women — particularly moms and women of color — and so many others. MomsRising advocates for access to healthy food for all kids, health care for all, earned sick days, and breastfeeding rights so that all children can have a healthy start. MomsRising maintains a Spanish language website: MamásConPoder.org. Sign up online at www.MomsRising.org — and follow us on our blog, and on Twitter and Facebook.