1 in 3 young Aussies being ‘ripped off’ by employers, finds report

A new study by the Melbourne Law School has found that almost a third of young people across Australia have been ripped off by their employers through wage exploitation, unpaid work, and more.

A survey of 2,814 workers under the age of 30 conducted by the Melbourne Law School has revealed that a large number of young Australians have fallen victim to wage exploitation, being paid through things like food, being forced to return their pay, and not being paid at all.

“Wage exploitation is rife among employers who hire young people,” Professor John Howe, who led the study, said.

“Young people don’t have much industrial knowledge or experience, so [they] are easy to take advantage of. They are also unlikely to challenge an employer, as many of them are insecure, and they worry about losing their jobs.”

According to the study, 33 per cent claimed that they had been paid $15 or less per hour, while 9.5 per cent added that they had been given food or products instead of direct remuneration. The most damaging, however, was that 17.9 per cent had not been paid at all.

What was also noted as an “alarming” finding in the report was the number of employers reducing the hours that their employees had put on their timesheets. The data showed that 35.54 per cent of workers experienced this, with 50 per cent of non-binary persons having reported experiencing this, compared to 33.06 per cent of men and 35.11 per cent of women.

Intertwined with this was the “cooking the books” data, which was a problem covered thoroughly in the report.

“It was also reported that employers often cooked the books, presumably to avoid fair wage rates and the Tax Office,” said Howe.

“Twenty-one per cent of the young people said they were sometimes paid off the books, and 12 per cent were always paid off the books. Eight per cent never even received a payslip.”

Howe acknowledged the new laws pertaining to deliberate underpayment of wages but called on the federal government to ensure that there was increased funding for compliance.

“The federal government recently made intentional underpayment of workers a criminal offence and named it for what it is, wage theft. We call on the federal government to increase funding for compliance.

But underpayment is hard to detect, and increasing the likelihood of detection is more likely to deter employers.”

The report concluded by highlighting some of the trust issues that young Australians have with regulators such as the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO), which prevented them from coming forward when facing wage exploitation.

For Aussies aged between 15-19, just 12.92 per cent expressed a willingness to seek help from the FWO, which the report labelled as “concerning”.

“On these bases, it appears that the FWO would be well served in pursuing educational and awareness initiatives directed specifically toward teenaged workers: a measure aligned with recommendations of the Migrant Workers’ Taskforce and with the Young Workers Centre’s call for greater education on workplace rights and safety training for high school students,” said the report.