Twenty years ago, a similar labor investigation into piecework in the electronics sector in Silicon Valley ended abruptly when industry representatives met with labor officials and politicians and asked that they be allowed to police themselves. Now, some labor activists and experts criticize the task force investigations for failing to scrupulously seek out home workers, examine the use of industrial chemicals and levy penalties against companies. For instance, the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which enforces workplace safety and sits on the task force, has not examined workers' use of chemicals or working conditions at home because it acts only on complaints, a spokesman said. Neither the state nor the federal labor officials plan to levy penalties on companies that have committed violations in this investigation. Even though these agencies usually do not levy fines, critics say penalties are the only way to deter companies from the practice in the future.
Federal regulations allow penalties up to the amount of the back wages and interest.
A statute of limitations also restricts state investigators to probe companies as far back as 1997. Federal investigators examine only the previous two years. This leaves out thousands of workers who worked at piecework rates over the last two decades. For example, nearly 20 former employees have told the Mercury News last June that Solectron Corp. had used home piecework arrangements dating back to the 1980s. However, state investigators said they could find no violations at Solectron since 1997.