Over the course of two years, journalist Sarah Jackson interviewed California workers, worker center staff, scholars, and policy leaders about wage theft — an issue that impacts thousands of working people in the state. In this article and the videos below, funded by The James Irvine Foundation, we hear directly from workers whose paychecks were shorted, their challenges recovering their wages, and the approaches that organizations are taking in California to combat this widespread issue.

Masthead photo credit: Robert Durell