Rubbish Check
Forbes Business · 24 August 2026
source“5.8 Million Workers Were Shortchanged On Wages Last Year As Minimum Wage Theft Hit Record High”
R2/ 10
Lightly altered
Rubbish Rating — 1 = base fact, 10 = pure rubbish
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In short
Rubbish Talk rates Forbes' claim that minimum wage theft "hit record high" a 2/10 because the Cleveland Fed's own paper confirms the incidence of violations did reach its highest recorded level in 2025, and Forbes' body text correctly flags that the dollar-value peak actually happened in 2023, not last year.
The Verdict
Lightly altered. The headline's core claim tracks the primary source almost exactly: the Cleveland Fed paper states the incidence of likely minimum-wage violations in the 10 most populous states hit its highest level in 2025, and the article accurately separates that from the underpayment amount, which peaked in 2023. The only iteration away from the base fact is that "5.8 million workers" is a modeled national extrapolation from a 10-state incidence rate, not a headcount, a nuance Forbes gestures at ("researchers estimated") but doesn't spell out.
What actually happened
Cleveland Fed researchers found that the share of non-exempt workers paid below the minimum wage across the ten most populous US states hit a record 5% in 2025. Applying that incidence rate to the national wage-and-salary workforce, they estimated roughly 6.5 million workers were paid below minimum wage, with about 5.8 million of those being outright violations rather than legal exemptions.
Key facts
- 5% incidence of below-minimum-wage pay among non-exempt workers in the 10 largest states, described by the Cleveland Fed as its highest recorded level in 2025.
- ~6.5 million total US workers estimated paid below minimum wage; ~5.8 million of those classed as outright violations, the rest legal exemptions.
- $95/week average underpayment among violators in 2025, down from a 2023 peak of over $110/week, but still above historical norms.
- 7 states had zero minimum-wage investigators, and 26 states had fewer than 10, as of 2018, per the Cleveland Fed's enforcement data.
- $7.25/hour federal minimum wage, unchanged since 2009, the longest freeze in US history.
What to watch for
Watch whether the Cleveland Fed's follow-up commentary clarifies that the 5.8 million figure is a national projection built from a 10-state incidence rate, not a direct headcount; if other outlets start reporting it as a hard census number, that's where the spin creeps in. Also watch for whether the 2026 update shows the underpayment-per-worker figure climbing back toward the 2023 peak, which would sharpen the "theft" framing considerably.
About this scoreThe R-Score is Rubbish Talk's editorial opinion on how far a headline's framing sits from what the underlying facts support. It is a judgement about presentation and emphasis, not an allegation that any outlet has acted dishonestly. Every figure we rely on is linked under Receipts so you can check it yourself.
