EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Executive Summary
Two thirds of surveyed migrant workers were paid less than they were owed under Australian law. This is not accidental. Our data reveals that many Australian businesses are deliberately using insecure employment structures to underpay migrants working on visas, and engaging in further systematic noncompliance to cover their tracks.
This is occurring on a systemic scale nationwide. Our data suggests international students alone may be short-changed by around $61 million every week — $3.18 billion per year.
"It is like an eco-system and everyone passes through it. These are those employers who work in less skilled sector and they can easily hire new people without affecting their business."
Male from Pakistan, 28, in Queensland. He was paid a flat rate with no payslips, well below his legal entitlement for every hour worked. When he found a better job, his employer simply hired the next new arrival.
This report presents findings on the working conditions of almost 10,000 migrants on temporary visas in Australia from the 2024 National Temporary Migrant Work Survey. This includes international students, backpackers, graduate visa holders, employer-sponsored workers and other migrants who worked in Australia on a temporary visa. This is the first national empirical study of migrant work experiences post-COVID. It focuses on these workers' lowest paid job in 2023–24.
Our data shows, for the first time, how underpayment, insecure employment structures, and noncompliant employer practices cluster together into a single system of exploitation. It reveals how businesses are exploiting gaps in the system that regulators have struggled to address.
Australian businesses systematically underpay migrants working on temporary visas.
Underpayment of migrant workers remains rampant across many industries. Employers paid two-thirds of migrant employees less than they were owed under the Fair Work Act. Almost a quarter were short-changed by at least $10 per hour.
Well over a third of all participants (36%) were paid below the floor of the National Minimum Wage, not taking into account award rates, penalty rates for after-hours work or casual loadings.
43 in every 100 migrant workers are paid below the National Minimum Wage
Source: MJI 2024 National Temporary Migrant Work Survey (n=8,213)
Employers systematically use insecure employment structures to disempower and exploit workers.
This isn't a gap in the system. It is the system. Many employers give themselves power over migrants by using insecure employment structures, then abuse that power to exploit these workers. Insecure employment structure is one of the strongest predictors of underpayment and broader noncompliance.
Over a third (35%) of migrants worked on an ABN (independent contractor) in their lowest paid job in 2023–24, more than four times the rate in the general workforce. The majority of those on ABNs (61%) were in industries where this was probably misclassification or 'sham contracting' — misclassifying employees as contractors to evade basic employment entitlements like the minimum wage and escape regulatory oversight.
85% of all ABN workers were paid less than the minimum entitlements they would have had under the Fair Work Act if they were classified as a casual employee.
Three quarters of migrant workers were engaged in insecure work arrangements
Participants' work arrangements in lowest paid job in 2023–24 (n=6,778)
A further 38% of migrants were engaged as a casual employee, entirely at the whim of their employer with no guaranteed hours or job security.
Many casual employees were paid wages that bore no relationship to the Fair Work Act, and far beneath the casual minimum wage.
37% of casual employees and 43% of ABN workers were paid below the National Minimum Wage — double the rate of permanent employees
Wages received in lowest paid job in 2023–24 (n=6,778)
The vast majority of all migrants (84%) reported working nights and weekends — times when work is less visible and often less safe. These migrants were almost 50% more likely to be paid below National Minimum Wage than those working only business hours.
Violations cluster: underpayment is part of a system of exploitation, not an isolated practice.
The worse the underpayment, the more likely the employer also issued misleading or no payslips, denied superannuation, paid cash, made wage deductions and engaged in practices that are indicators of modern slavery. These aren't separate problems caused by scattered rogue employers. For the first time, our data shows this is a single system of noncompliance.
The more a business underpaid an employee, the more likely that business also breached other workplace obligations and engaged the worker as a casual or night/weekend worker
Source: MJI 2024 National Temporary Migrant Work Survey
Systemic noncompliance enables employers to cover their tracks.
In insecure jobs, it is hard for workers to prove underpayment. Casual workers must demonstrate every hour worked without regular schedules. This is even worse for ABN workers, who aren't entitled to minimum wages unless they can first prove they are actually misclassified employees.
A quarter (23%) of participants were paid at least some of their wages in cash. This figure is alarmingly high. But it has fallen from 44% in our 2016 study, as cash has decreased in the economy. Employers now use ABNs and misleading payslips interchangeably with cash to underpay migrant workers 'off the books'.
Indicators of underpayment
Three practices that reliably signal serious underpayment.
Where employees had any of these three markers, around 7 in 10 were paid below the National Minimum Wage and around 9 in 10 were paid below their minimum legal entitlement.
Likelihoods are from regressions controlling for industry, employment type, gender, age and visa. Source: MJI survey, n = 5,505.
Our data shows employers take further steps that conceal underpayment of migrant workers. Employer provision of payslips has improved since 2016, but 16% still do not receive payslips. But for many employers, payslips give a false veneer of compliance: one in twelve employees (8%) received a payslip that disguised underpayment by omitting hours worked, and 40% received payslips reflecting underpaid wages.
What must change
First-term reforms were a necessary start, but addressing migrant exploitation is unfinished business.
From strengthened sham contracting provisions to new criminal wage theft offences, the government's first-term reforms were an important first step. Some were not in place at the time of the survey and may yet have an impact. But they are insufficient to effectively address the systemic exploitation revealed in this report.
Our findings indicate that migrant exploitation must be tackled by recalibrating the drivers of employers' unchecked leverage over migrant workers. Stronger interventions are required to prevent employers from using insecure work arrangements and immigration settings to systematically avoid their responsibilities under the Fair Work Act. The government should also invest in reducing the hurdles migrants face to recovering the unpaid billions in wages they are owed.
The enforcement gaps identified in this report distort competition: businesses that exploit migrants gain unfair advantages over businesses that comply. This is not a niche issue. It extends to all corners of the Australian economy.
Tackling the roots of the problem has sat in the 'too hard basket' because we couldn't see the system clearly. Now it is clear how employers structure work to evade the Fair Work Act, which violations cluster together, how to enable workers to come forward, and what regulators and businesses can look for to detect underpayment and deeper exploitation.
This isn't intractable. Our research demonstrates that there are key intervention points.
Address these structural gaps, and workers regain the power to advocate for themselves. And when they can, hidden systems of exploitation collapse. Compliant businesses get fair competition, workers get protection, and everyone benefits.
Recommendations for the Commonwealth Government
Expand sham contracting accountability.
Reduce the burden on workers to prove misclassification, strengthen enforcement of misclassification and sham contracting laws, and consider accessorial liability for sham contracting within business operations.
Protect workers who report abuse.
Strengthen and expand access to the Workplace Justice Visa and reduce reliance on employer sponsorship for permanent residency pathways.
Expand proactive detection and support.
Invest in whole-of-government enforcement processes targeting poorly performing industries with insecure migrant workforces and establish dedicated migrant worker support services including Migrant Worker Centres in every state and territory and increased FWO support.
Link sponsorship eligibility to compliance.
Connect government agency and court data to DHA to ensure business eligibility to sponsor migrant workers takes account of prior workplace noncompliance, and industry-level risk.
Increase transparency and accountability.
Introduce a national Labour Hire Licensing Scheme and an enforceable risk-based due diligence obligation under the Modern Slavery Act, reform payslip obligations to prevent businesses from disguising noncompliance, and explore strengthened general protections preventing employer retaliation against migrant workers.
Ensure migrants recover the wages they are owed.
Establish underpayment jurisdiction in the Fair Work Commission alongside a new co-located Fair Work Court, extend the Fair Entitlements Guarantee to migrant workers, and create a government-funded wage guarantee scheme.
Increase cap on student working hours.
Explore increasing the work limitation on Student visas above 48 hours per fortnight to reduce exploitation risks and respond to increased cost of living in Australia.
Invest in compulsory worker rights education.
Ensure visa holders receive clear, accessible information about workplace rights and support services at key touchpoints, including with visa grant and multiple times post-arrival.
Detailed recommendations for industry will be released in a separate Practical Guidance. See Part 12 for full recommendations.
About this research: Based on 9,963 valid survey responses from workers on temporary visas across Australia. Fieldwork conducted in 2024. Survey offered online in English, Mandarin, Spanish, Nepali, Tamil and Arabic. Survey anonymous and confidentially distributed through 50+ education providers, unions, community organisations and government partners, as well as directly via social media and other channels. Respondent quotes are drawn from open-text survey responses, selected to be representative of themes in the data. Some quotes have been translated or lightly edited for clarity. Underpayment was calculated via 2 methods: (1) in relation to National Minimum Wage and casual minimum (25% loading), and (2) based on each participant's individual minimum entitlements taking into account award (based on job), penalty rates (if worked nights/weekends), casual loading (if not entitled to paid leave), and youth rates (based on age).
Full methodology and interactive charts are online at www.migrantjustice.org.