Wage Theft Prevention and Wage Recovery Act

Current understanding

To be populated as evidence accumulates.

Evidence log

• 2025-04-09 — Protecting Employees and Retirees in Business Bankruptcies Act of 2025: 2025 — Related wage-priority legislation: Protecting Employees and Retirees in Business Bankruptcies Act of 2025 would raise the Chapter 11 priority cap for unpaid employee wage and benefit claims to $20,000 and eliminate the 180-day lookback, complementing wage-recovery enforcement by improving worker recovery when employers file bankruptcy. (novelty: 3)
• 2025-03-06 — Guaranteeing Overtime for Truckers Act: Related FLSA overtime legislation introduced: the Guaranteeing Overtime for Truckers Act (HR1962) would remove the Motor Carrier Act exemption and extend FLSA overtime protections to interstate truck drivers, complementing broader wage-and-hour enforcement bills by expanding the covered worker population. (novelty: 2)
• 2026-05-15 — Defining and Delimiting the Exemptions for Executive, Administrative, Professional, Outside Sales, and Computer Employees; Implementation of Federal Court Judgments: Related wage-and-hour regulatory context: DOL issued a final rule removing the vacated 2024 FLSA white-collar overtime exemption rule from the CFR and restoring prior regulatory text, keeping the pre-2024 EAP salary thresholds as the operative standard while wage-recovery legislation remains pending. (novelty: 2)
• 2026-05-27 — Department of Labor Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act Annual Adjustments for 2026: Context on existing wage-and-hour enforcement: DOL’s 2026 civil monetary penalty inflation adjustment (including FLSA wage-and-hour penalties) is cancelled due to a missing October 2025 CPI-U reading, holding statutory penalty caps at 2025 levels while wage-recovery legislation is pending. (novelty: 2)
• 2026-07-02 — Living Wage for Federal Contractors Act: Parallel wage-floor legislation introduced: the Living Wage for Federal Contractors Act (HR9571) targets minimum compensation for federal contract workers, complementing wage-recovery enforcement bills by raising the underlying wage baseline for a specific worker population. (novelty: 2)
• 2025-04-07 — No Tax Breaks for Union Busting (NTBUB) Act: Related worker-protection legislation: the No Tax Breaks for Union Busting Act would deny tax deductions for employer anti-organizing expenditures, complementing wage-and-hour enforcement bills by targeting a different employer conduct area through the tax code. (novelty: 2)
• 2026-06-24 — Wage Theft Prevention and Wage Recovery Act: Senate companion S4919 introduced and referred to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions on 2026-06-24, complementing the House version (HR9458). (novelty: 2)
• 2026-06-30 — Earned Wage Access Consumer Protection Act: Parallel wage-payment legislation advancing: the Earned Wage Access Consumer Protection Act (HR9330) was ordered reported from committee 29-22, addressing pre-payday wage access rather than post-payday recovery. (novelty: 3)

Open questions

Related