Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, January 25th, title: As the Spring Festival approaches, who are still worried about arrears of wages?
——Focus on new developments and changes in the issue of unpaid wages
Xinhua News Agency "Xinhua Viewpoint" reporters Jiang Lin, Xie Ying, and Li Ping
At the end of the year and the New Year, the settlement of wages and returning home for the New Year are the biggest expectations of many people.
However, many workers still encounter the problem of wage arrears.
The difference from previous years is that not only migrant workers, but also practitioners from some Internet platforms and off-campus training institutions have also joined the salary-seeking team.
Clean up year after year, when will you no longer change your salary?
The reporter of "Xinhua Viewpoint" conducted multiple interviews.
The number of people in arrears and the overall amount of "double down" Internet, training machines constitute a new high incidence
Wu Qipei, a 31-year-old loader operator, had been worrying about the “final payment” of 20,000 yuan when he worked in the fifth section of the Mianjiu Expressway in Sichuan. The construction unit repeatedly buckled but refused to pay.
In October 2020, a worker transferred the link from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security on "During the eradication of wage arrears", "I tried it, complaints here really work!" Wu Qipei hurriedly filled in the relevant information.
Two months later, he and two other workers' wages of 38,000 yuan were paid.
However, the money did not come from Wu Chipei's construction unit, but from the general contractor of the project more upstream.
Anhui Youchenghang Tunnel Engineering Co., Ltd., which actually hired Wu Chipei, and its legal representative refused to cooperate with the investigation during the negotiation process. Due to the crime of refusal to pay labor remuneration, the next step will be transferred to the public security agency by the human resources and social department for criminal responsibility.
In 2020, the human resources and social departments in various regions will settle 55,000 wage cases and pay 6.52 billion yuan to 648,000 workers. The number of people involved and the amount of money involved are "double-decreased", down 22% and 18% respectively year-on-year.
911 companies and individuals have been included in the "blacklist" of unpaid wages.
According to data from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, in recent years, continuous heavy strikes, especially with the implementation of the "Regulations on Guaranteeing the Payment of Migrant Workers" and the gradual implementation of various security systems, the situation of high and frequent occurrences of wage arrears has been significantly curbed, and the effectiveness of the control of wage arrears Further consolidation.
The field of engineering construction is still the "hardest hit area" for the problem of wage arrears.
According to data from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, as of the end of December 2020, my country's verification of wage arrears in the engineering and construction sector involved 213,700 laborers and an amount of 2.595 billion yuan, accounting for 71% and 82% of all wage arrears cases.
The reporter noticed that in the past year, new energy automobile manufacturers, education and training institutions, Internet platforms, hotels, and catering companies have become new places where wages are frequently paid.
From November 6, 2020 to 2021 before the Spring Festival, the “special campaign to eradicate wages in the winter” will also be the focus of law enforcement inspections in manufacturing industries that employ more migrant workers and service industries that are heavily affected by the epidemic.
"From a national perspective, the situation of wage arrears in the manufacturing and service industries is generally better than that of the construction industry. From a regional perspective, the construction industry is still dominated by wage arrears in the central and western regions, but in the east, especially in the more developed coastal areas, such as Shanghai , Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong and other provinces, the manufacturing and service industries are relatively prominent. During the special operation, the number and amount of wages involved in the investigation and handling of cases have exceeded those in the construction industry." Li Xinwang, director of the Labor Security Supervision Bureau of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, revealed .
"Old problems" are still unresolved "New situations" are different
In response to the "stubborn illness" in the field of engineering construction with high wages, Zhu Guowei, a professor at the School of Business Administration of Hunan University, analyzed that on the one hand, the order of the construction market still needs to be further regulated. The problems of subcontracting, illegal subcontracting, and unapproved construction are still outstanding. Form a very long chain of interests in operation.
Natural persons of large and small "contractors" actually undertake the construction of the project, but their ability to resist business risks is usually insufficient. Whether they can pay their wages on time and in full depends entirely on whether the upstream can allocate the project funds in time.
On the other hand, the labor order in the engineering construction field is not standardized. The general contracting enterprises neglect the management of migrant workers working on the project site. The phenomenon of contract management by construction contracting enterprises at all levels is more common, and the rate of signing labor contracts is low.
Migrant workers tend to advance their living expenses on a monthly basis, and the other parts are kept by the "contractor" and their wages are settled at the end of the year.
If the subcontracting company defaults on the contract payment for the "contractor", it will directly affect the final wages of migrant workers.
The causes of wage arrears in the manufacturing and service industries are different.
"Some hotels and catering companies owe salaries, which is indeed due to increased operating pressures affected by the epidemic. However, some education and training institutions, manufacturing companies and Internet platforms, including P2P online lending institutions, Internet driving schools, and Internet housing leasing platforms, are mainly themselves There are defects in the business model. Companies that have problems with wages often collect large amounts of advance payments to mismatch funds or even misappropriate funds for other purposes, or rely heavily on external financing for rapid expansion. It is easy to break the capital chain and cause a large number of wages arrears. "Li Xinwang analyzed.
In 2020, the winning education with more than 1,100 campuses "crashed".
According to the reporter's interview, only one campus in Dongzhimen, Beijing, has unpaid student class fees as much as 14 million yuan.
However, this "advanced" 14 million yuan is missing, parents have no way to refund fees, dozens of teachers are in arrears of wages, and some of them are also affected by the withdrawal of social security, which affects the reimbursement of medical expenses and the settlement of points.
Yan Liangqi, a lawyer from Beijing Yingke (Jinhua) Law Firm, said that the lack of strict supervision and strong market demand has caused some education and training institutions to continue to expand rapidly regardless of risks. The extensive and brutal growth model has led to inefficient use of funds; if the previous "snowball" If the expenses collected in advance are spent, and the financing cannot keep up, it is destined to face a shortage of funds, and the wages and rights of employees will inevitably be damaged.
Clean up year after year when will no longer change salary "worry"
How to deal with the outstanding wage problem?
What are the key issues that need to be solved to eradicate wage arrears?
Li Xinwang said frankly that, on the one hand, the number of cases of arrears of wages in history is large, and it is difficult to resolve them.
Among the clues reflected on the website of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, about 65% occurred before 2018.
Some labor contracts are missing, and some construction enterprises and construction units involved in the case no longer exist. It is indeed very difficult for labor security supervision agencies to find out the facts and fix evidence.
Some local human resources and social departments have also reported that the grassroots, especially the front-line labor security supervision and law enforcement force is seriously insufficient, which to a certain extent restricts the advancement of the eradication of wages.
The reporter learned that since 2020, labor security supervision and law enforcement teams at the provincial and municipal levels in Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Liaoning, Jiangsu, Fujian, Jiangxi and other places have been revoked, and the backlog of law enforcement tasks is at the county and district level, but the grassroots are affected. There are many restrictions on staffing, law enforcement equipment, and business training, and the ability to clear debts and law enforcement is obviously not suitable for the new situation.
On the other hand, workers who win the "lawsuit" often get no money.
"According to our analysis of the WeChat mini-program'National Clues for Eradication of Unpaid Salaries', there are nearly half of the clues. Workers have already received arbitration awards or won the court’s judgment. However, these awards and judgments have been executed due to various reasons. The reason is to no avail." Li Xinwang said.
According to the reporter’s understanding, although the "Regulations on Guaranteeing the Payment of Migrant Workers’ Wages" stipulate that a wage deposit system for migrant workers is implemented in the field of engineering construction, the deposit can be used in accordance with the procedures in the event of arrears in construction projects to quickly resolve the arrears, but in other industries this The guarantee system is still in a blank state.
The system design has not yet formed a complete closed loop to eradicate the problem of wage arrears. To a certain extent, some workers won the lawsuit but cannot get the money, and their rights and interests cannot be compensated.
At present, only Shanghai and Shenzhen in China have established a mutual aid payment system for wages in arrears. In the case of business difficulties, bankruptcy, business owners’ escape, etc., workers’ remuneration can be guaranteed to a certain extent. No such underpinning system has been established.
"Whether it is a migrant worker, or a worker in a manufacturing industry or an Internet platform, every wage arrears is related to the source of a family's livelihood." Li Xinwang said, "For every clue of wage arrears received by the Mini Program, we will be highly Pay attention. The Supervision Bureau of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security will use various methods to supervise the local human resources and social departments to verify and deal with it, so as to respond to each and everything has results. In the near future, we will also take more practical measures to guide localities to increase debt clearance work Efforts to ensure that more workers can get wages before the Spring Festival and celebrate the New Year with peace of mind."