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A small Seattle department is taking on gig economy giants and winning.

The city's labor enforcement team scoring multimillion dollars in back wage settlements for people doing gig work from companies like Uber and Amazon.

Back in 2022, the city of Seattle passed a series of ordinances aimed at improving the working conditions of these gig workers.

That included a minimum wage based on time and mileage of each job and the accrual of paid sick time.

MARCHESE: These laws have not existed in the state or in the city before.

They are some of the first laws of their kind in the country.

The goal is to bring them closer to or to exceed minimum wage, in part because these drivers are bearing the cost of all of the work that they're doing.

They own their cars, they fuel their cars, they service their cars, they pay insurance, they deal with damage, repairs, things like that, and that costs money.

JACKSON (VO): The labor enforcement team enforces Seattle's labor laws and prioritizes cases from low-wage workers in certain industries, unlike Washington's Department of Labor and Industries, which has to investigate every complaint and often deals with much smaller cases.

Last August, Seattle's Labor office won its largest settlement, collecting $15 million in backpay, interest and penalties for more than 16,000 Uber Eats workers.

The office determined Uber Eats violated transparency and minimum wage laws for these workers.

At the time, Uber Eats denied the allegations, but agreed to pay the gig workers.

Since 2020, the office says it's recovered $52 million for more than 100,000 workers in Seattle.

I'm Paris Jackson.

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