California prevailing wage enforcement statistics by fiscal year

What the Public Works Unit did, by fiscal year

Labor Code 90.5(d) requires the Labor Commissioner to report to the Legislature each year by March 1 on the effectiveness of the field enforcement unit. DIR's reports call it the Bureau of Field Enforcement (DIR's legislative reports page), and DIR lists a report for each year through FY 2021-22. Each report has a Public Works section for the Bureau's Public Works Unit, which the report says investigates complaints under the state's prevailing wage and apprenticeship laws and conducts audits for back wages owed to workers. The first column links to that year's report. Newest first.

• Cases opened. The reports say the unit does not conduct inspections and measures its performance by cases opened for audit purposes. Their footnote reads the newest year as 2,507 audits conducted and 514 civil wage and penalty assessments issued. One caveat: the FY 2015-16 report's own footnote reads that year as 2,006 audits and 479 assessments; this page uses its Public Works table (1,565 and 636).
• Assessments issued. The reports' name for this is civil wage and penalty assessments, or CWPAs. It counts assessments, not violations or citations.
• * Debarment orders. Each report's Public Works section says how many construction companies and individuals the Labor Commissioner signed debarment orders for that year. FY 2019-20, FY 2020-21 and FY 2021-22 are worded "one construction company and individual", which can mean one company and one individual, so the 1 marked * in those rows may count two parties. See how debarment happens.

Wages and penalties assessed and collected

Dollars from the same Public Works sections, rounded to whole dollars here. The CSV has the cents.

• Wages. The reports through FY 2017-18 call these wages found due and wages recovered. From FY 2018-19 they show total wages, which is prevailing wages plus training funds. This table shows each report's total wages figure; for FY 2021-22 that is Table 7's Total Wages, because the report's Table 1 prints only the prevailing wages row (see "Where a report disagrees with itself" below).
• Penalties include penalties under Labor Code 1777.7, which the statute sets for a contractor or subcontractor that knowingly violated the apprenticeship section, Labor Code 1777.5 (see apprentice numbers by quarter).
• Collected amounts can include money found due in earlier reporting periods, according to the footnotes to the FY 2021-22 report's Table 7. Do not subtract collected from assessed to get an outstanding balance.

FY 2021-22 in detail

The newest report splits the unit's dollars by type in its Table 7 (FY 2021-22 report, Public Works section). Row labels are the report's. One cell, marked †, is not Table 7's figure.

• † From the report's amounts collected tables 2 and 4. Table 7 prints $4,770.294.65 in this cell.

Of the $12,847,695.33 in penalties assessed, $3,639,826.95 (28%) was assessed under Labor Code section 1777.7. Penalties collected are the totals the report's amounts collected tables give, which are not the same as the sum of the two penalty rows (see the notes below).

How to read these numbers

• Fiscal years, not calendar years. Each year in this table is the fiscal year its report names.
• An assessment starts with a written notice. After an investigation finds a violation, the Labor Commissioner issues a civil wage and penalty assessment to the contractor or subcontractor, or both, under Labor Code 1741(a). To contest one, you ask for review in writing within 60 days after service under Labor Code 1742(a); if you do not, the assessment becomes final. Details in the appeal guide.
• No audit rate. The Public Works sections give no count of public works contractors or projects, so these figures cannot show the chance that any one contractor is audited. This page does not estimate one.
• One unit, not every letter. These are the Public Works Unit's figures. For what a Compliance Monitoring Unit letter means for you, read the CMU audit letter guide. For penalties that can apply to late certified payroll, read the penalties guide.

Where a report disagrees with itself

Some reports print a number twice and the copies differ. We show which one this page uses:

• FY 2015-16. The unit table prints penalties assessed as $25,078,769; the results table prints $25,078,769.39. This site uses the figure with cents.
• FY 2015-16. The footnote under the results table says 2,006 audits and 479 assessments; the Public Works table says 1,565 cases opened and 636 assessments. This site uses the Public Works table.
• FY 2021-22. Total penalties collected: table 7 prints "$4,770.294.65" and the amounts collected tables print $4,769,295.16. This site uses the amounts collected tables (table 2 and table 4 agree).
• FY 2021-22. The penalty rows of table 7 add up to $4,770,294.65 collected; the amounts collected tables say $4,769,295.16.
• FY 2021-22. Table 1 of the FY 2021-22 report prints $8,240,155.17 as Public Works wages assessed, which is the Prevailing Wages row of Table 7. The reports for FY 2018-19 to FY 2020-21 print total wages in Table 1. This site uses Table 7's Total Wages, $8,528,673.16, to match them.

How current this is

DIR's legislative reports page lists Bureau of Field Enforcement reports 2011 through 2022, and the newest covers fiscal year 2021-2022. We read the page and all 7 reports in this table on October 23, 2026. When DIR posts a newer report this page changes with it.

Your filing, whichever project you are on

WellStanding prepares the WH-347 and the eCPR from the payroll export you already run, and a person reviews every filing. You review the finished filing and sign the certification in one step, and nothing is filed until you have signed. The certification is always yours; we never sign for you. The reason the certification is yours is in Labor Code 1776(a) and 8 CCR 16401.

Download the table: california-prevailing-wage-enforcement.csv. Cite as: WellStanding, California Labor Commissioner Public Works Unit figures, FY 2015-16 to FY 2021-22, read on October 23, 2026 from DIR's Bureau of Field Enforcement fiscal year reports, https://wellstanding.com/data/california-prevailing-wage-enforcement/.

Questions