Picketers aim illuminate illegal employment practices
By Mike LaBella
April 11, 2019
HAVERHILL – More than a dozen union carpenters, including members of New England Regional Council of Carpenters Local 339, stood at the corner in front of City Hall for several hours Thursday morning to illuminate what they claim is rampant tax fraud tainting the construction industry.
They held picket signs and banners bearing statements such as, “Tax fraud impacts me,” and “Construction industry tax fraud costs taxpayers over $80 per second and $2.6 billion per year.”
Organizers said the event was intended to educate the public on the magnitude of illegal construction employment practices, discuss their impact on Haverhill and Massachusetts, and call for a unified front against what they called an insidious activity. Similar events took place Thursday in Lynn, Framingham and Portland, Maine, they said.
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Local 339 issued a statement saying that each year, labor brokers and contractors cheat their tax obligations by misclassifying their hires, such as classifying a carpenter as a laborer, and paying an estimated 1.2 million workers “off the books,” (also known as “under the table”), thereby robbing taxpayers of up to $2.6 billion through lost federal income, employment taxes, and state income taxes.
Union member Adam DiGiovanni of Haverhill said he is reaching out to city officials in hopes they will support the creation of an ordinance that would penalize an employer for engaging in unfair wage practices on large construction projects that involve taxpayer money, including projects that receive tax credits.
“Other communities have passed these kinds of ordinances, including Springfield, Quincy and Lynn,” he said. “There needs to be oversight as right now it’s a free for all.”
He said that such an ordinance would typically speak to large-scale commercial construction projects valued at $10 million or more, and typically not the “local home-builder market.”