The Nature of Temp Staffing
Nature of Temp Staffing
There is a role for temporary staffing in our economy – for short term fluctuation in the need for labor, the temporary replacement of direct hire workers on leave or as a pathway to permanent employment. But the sad reality is that the vast majority of workers in the staffing industry in Illinois are working as “perma-temps.” If the juxtaposition of the words “permanent” with “temporary” strikes you as absurd, it is but it also accurately describes the absurd nature of how most of staffing agencies operate in today’s economy.
Perma-Temping Is Not Job Creation
Across the country and in Illinois, there has been an explosion in the use of the use of workers in industrial work through staffing agencies, more than doubling the number of laborers assigned out in Illinois over the last two decades – from 300,000 in 2005 to 650,000 today. Most of this growth has happened in perma-temping. The claims of the staffing industry that it is a job creator are just wrong. Take away the staffing agency from the equation and the job is still there. In perma-temping, all the staffing agencies do is to turn good jobs into bad. Instead of having a full-time job with job security, access to benefits and opportunities for advance, perma-temps have no job security, rarely receive any benefits and are typically paid far less than their direct hire counterparts.
Perma-Temping Could Legalize Discrimination and other Rights Violations
The vast majority of staffing agency workers in Illinois are people of color – over 85%. Direct hire employees are not. With perma-temps making on average $4/hour less than direct hire employees, Illinois companies are creating a two-tiered wage scale based on race. No company could get away with segregating its direct hire workforce by race, paying people of color so much less, but by inserting a staffing agency as an intermediary, these companies are claiming there is nothing illegal about the disparate pay practices. This role of staffing agencies as a shield for discrimination based on race, gender, age, disability is rampant throughout the industry. We also see this with sexual harassment (companies claiming workers from staffing agencies are not their employees), unsafe practices, wage theft, suppression of wages membership in bargaining units where a union is present and others.
Matched Pair Testing Unmasks the Dirty Secrets of the Staffing Industry
In 2019 (pre-pandemic), the Equal Rights Center conducted matched pair tests at a representative sample of 60 industrial staffing agencies in the Chicago labor market using a random selection process taking into account the neighborhood geography of the Chicago area. ERC sought to measure the prevalence of race discrimination in the making of work assignments by industrial staffing agencies. ERC’s methodology paired Black testers with Spanish-speaking Latinx testers who were similar in gender, age and work experience. The results are shocking and, yet, not surprising as the results confirmed what thousands of Black laborers experience every day.
The study found that 82% of jobs offered through staffing agencies were segregated based on race – with different job assignments being offered to Black and Latinx testers within moments each other who were equal in all respects except race. 38% of staffing agencies tested discriminated against Black applicants.
Matched Pair Testing Leads to Advocacy and Policy Change to Address Discrimination
Following disclosure of the rampant discrimination in temp staffing in Illinois, the Illinois Attorney General, Kwame Raul, committed to enforce anti-discrimination laws against discriminatory staffing agencies and the companies that use them. See Opening the Door Report Release at 5:40. The AG has since launched multiple investigations into staffing agencies and the companies that use them resulting, in some cases, in consent decrees requiring meaningful steps be taken to stop future race discrimination (AG Race Discrimination Consent Decree - Mistica), gender discrimination (AG Gender Discrimination Consent Decree - Service Master), sexual harassment ( ), or in lawsuits challenging illegal no-poach agreements among staffing agencies designed to suppress temp workers’ wages (AG Lawsuit on No Poach Agreements-Voyant Beauty; AG Lawsuit on No Poach Agreements-Colony).
Recently, two Illinois courts have certified a class of thousands of African American temp workers who allege that they were discriminated against by staffing agencies when making assignments to their client companies. In other cases, Illinois courts have approved class action settlements covering thousands of African American temp workers who alleged they were wrongfully denied assignments because of their race or gender.
“My dad and I took two busses and a train to get to the staffing agency because I was told there was work. When we showed up and they saw I was Black, they took us off the assignment. When I claimed I was discriminated against they said I wasn't even there - I learned later that no record is made until they actually assign you. It was as if I was the invisible man."
Finally, in 2023, advocates used the information gathered in the matched pair testing study to launch sweeping reform to the Illinois law that regulates the staffing industry, the Temp Worker Fairness and Safety Act (see IL HB1604 and summary fact sheet). If enacted, the law would, among other things, require:
A record be made and receipt be given each time a laborer seeks an assignment at a staffing agency identifying their race and gender;
Annual reporting to the Illinois Department of Labor by staffing agencies on the number of laborers assigned annually, broken down by branch agency and including information on the race and gender of both applicants and assignees; and
Annual reporting of the number of temps converted to direct hire employment.
In Illinois, the matched pair testing study set of a chain of events that have thrust temp workers themselves into the lead in validating their experiences of having their rights violated and in advocating for change.
Workers & advocates in Springfield, IL fighting for the Illinois Temporary Fairness and Safety Act.
NLAN is currently pursuing similar match paired testing projects in two Southern cities in collaboration with Equal Rights Center, Workrise and Unemployed Workers United. The results from those studies will add to the pool of evidence uncovering race and gender discrimination in temp staffing and help shape local policy impacting temp workers and their families.