"SUPPORTING STATEMENT:
TJX’s Vendor Code of Conduct says, “vendors must abide by all applicable laws relating to wages and benefits” and “respect the
rights of their workers to choose... to freely associate and to bargain collectively where such rights are recognized by law.” TJX’s
2021 Global Corporate Responsibility Report explains these principles are informed by the United Nations Guiding Principles on
Business and Human Rights, and, as part of its commitment, TJX has audited hundreds of factories in its supply chain.
Nonetheless, TJX’s existing standards and disclosures fail to address an issue affecting reputational and financial risks and human
rights concerns.
Supply chain disruptions have been a major challenge facing retailers in recent years. Exacerbating this is the fact some of the
trucking companies used by retailers to move goods may misclassify their drivers as “independent contractors” rather
than “employees.”
Misclassification is a significant problem as some trucking companies misclassify drivers hauling goods from U.S. ports as well as
“last mile” delivery drivers.
Following an award-winning, investigative series by USA Today, the paper’s editorial board compared exploitative independent
contractor arrangements at southern California ports to “modem-day ... indentured servitude,” prompting four U.S. Senators to
demand major U.S. retailers to cut ties with trucking companies showing such a “brazen disregard for ... worker’s safety and rights.
The southern California ports process 40% of all U.S. shipping container traffic.
In response to this situation, the California Labor Commissioner’s office has over the past decade awarded more than $50 million
to misclassified port drivers, while millions of dollars have been awarded in private litigation involving port drivers. According to a
2014 report by the National Employment Law Project, the Californian port trucking industry is potentially liable for $850 million in
wage theft each year from misclassification. (https://www..nelp.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Big-Rig-Overhaul-MisclassificationPort-Truck-Drivers-Labor-Law-Enforce-ment.pdf)
Misclassification risk extends to retailers, given recent Californian legislation. A 2021 law, SB 338, indicates there could be 16,000
misclassified drivers in California’s ports and calls this largely “immigrant workforce” the “last American sharecroppers.” The law
makes customers of a port trucking company jointly liable for future violations of labor, employment, and health and safety law by a
trucking company that the Labor Commissioner’s office has publicly identified as having previously violated these laws."