This report explores the economic impact of wage theft in South Australia. Wage theft is widespread and likely growing, impacting up to 170,000 South Australian workers to varying degrees, and almost certainly costing South Australian workers, collectively, more than $500 million a year.

The women who make our clothes are entrenched in a cycle of poverty — because big Australian brands allow poverty wages.

This paper examines current or proposed changes to the sharing economy, regulations hitting the labour hire industry, proposals to tackle ‘wage theft’, and the introduction of industrial manslaughter laws, in the context of the rapid growth of the Victorian public sector since 2014.

This report recommends that the federal gvernment take immediate steps to protect vulnerable workers subject to wage theft and exploitation by companies who continue to operate with impunity.

This report aims to quantify the likely impact of wage theft on Queensland workers and the Queensland economy, in both the form of regular-wage theft and the non-payment of superannuation guarantee contributions.