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The
report, prepared by the Treasury Department with help from the
Justice Department, Labor Department and Federal Trade
Commission (FTC), found companies had the upper hand in setting
wages because they generally knew more about the labor market
than workers do.
Further, workers may not be able to move or to afford an
extended job search in order to find better-paid work.
"These conditions can enable firms to exert market power, and
consequently offer lower wages and worse working conditions,
even in labor markets that are not highly concentrated," the
report said.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told a White House forum
highlighting the report that workers are often at a disadvantage
due to required non-compete or non-disclosure agreements;
collusion between employers to keep wages low; or a lack of
transparency that keeps workers unaware of prevailing wage
rates.
"Ultimately these conditions cumulatively yield an uneven market
where employers have more leverage than workers," she said.
"This is what economists mean when we refer to monopsonistic
power" among buyers of labor.
The White House event featured several workers who complained
about unfair employment practices at prior jobs.
One of the speakers was a temporary worker at Alphabet's Google,
Shannon Wait, who said she was let go from her $15 per hour job
for complaining on social media about a broken company-issued
water bottle.
Google officials did not immediately respond to requests for
comment.
Wait eventually won a settlement with Google which allows
workers to discuss working conditions, according to the
Communications Workers of America.
The report discusses ways that firms can hold down wages,
including conspiring with other companies to avoid hiring each
other's workers and requiring employees to sign non-compete
agreements that prevent them from leaving for higher wages.
The report cited a paper that found one-in-five workers is
currently covered by a non-compete agreement, meaning they
cannot leave to work for a competitor.
"A careful review of credible academic studies places the
decrease in wages at roughly 20% relative to the level in a
fully competitive market. In some industries and occupations,
like manufacturing, estimates of wage losses are even higher,"
the report said.
The U.S. unemployment rate fell to a two-year low of 3.8% in
February but hourly earnings were flat, partly because the
return of workers to lower-paying industries offset wage
increases in some sectors as companies competed for scarce
workers.
Antitrust enforcement efforts usually focus on prices companies
charge for goods and services. Antitrust enforcers have brought
labor antitrust cases in the past, and the Trump
Administration's Justice Department brought one against a
no-poach agreement between rail equipment suppliers in 2018, but
they remain rare.
(Reporting by Diane Bartz and David Lawder; Editing by David
Gregorio)
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