Institute for Research on Labor and Employment

Janitors are an essential part of California’s economy. Janitors clean, sanitize, and maintain buildings and other indoor spaces while being some of the most exploited workers in the service industry. Many private sector janitors earn poverty wages and lack benefits, are routinely misclassified, subjected to wage theft, experience sexual harassment, and are exposed to unsafe working conditions. Based on our analysis of government data from the 5-year sample (2015–2019) of the American Community Survey (ACS) and a pooled 10-year sample (2011–2020) of the Current Population Survey Outgoing Rotation Group (CPS ORG), this research brief finds that across almost all measures of job quality and economic well-being, private-sector female janitors are significantly worse off than their male counterparts, earning lower median wages than male janitors, and reporting higher rates of poverty at nearly 45%. Low wages are prevalent in the private sector, with almost two-thirds of private-sector janitors earning low wages. Subcontracting, a widespread practice in the janitorial industry, has contributed to the high rates of regulatory violations that undermine janitors’ employment conditions, such as misclassification, wage theft, tax fraud, gender discrimination, and sexual harassment and assault.