As North Carolina moves into a new year, workers are facing increasingly difficult obstacles. 

In a recent Oxfam report, North Carolina ranked last for Best States to Work, comparing data for wages, worker protections and the right to organize. 

At the same time, North Carolina ranks in the top two states for business.

Clermont Ripley, the co-director of the North Carolina Justice Center’s Workers’ Rights Project, said she believes the main issue is the state’s priorities. 

“I think we are making policy decisions where we are prioritizing maximizing corporate profits, minimizing taxes on corporations,” Ripley said. “We aren’t investing properly in public education or childcare and things that are needed for a business to be successful in the long term.”

Health and safety protections are another significant issue, according to Ripley, because of rates of high heat exposure.

“North Carolina has no enforceable protections to protect workers from heat illness or heat stress,” Ripley said. “And people are getting sick and dying.”  

In 2021, NPR investigated heat-related deaths in the workforce. It found that at least 384 workers had died in the U.S. between 2011-2021.

Heat-related stress in the workforce is a prevalent issue in immigrant populations, as well. Forty-three percent of the agriculture, fishing and forestry occupations in the U.S. were made up of immigrant workers in 2022, according to a 2024 study from Pew Research Center. 

According to a National Library of Medicine study from 2025, non-U.S. citizens working on farms in the U.S. died more often from heat exposure than U.S. citizens, with 19.8% of deaths for non-U.S. citizens being heat-related.

Ripley said language and social barriers make it difficult to get protections at work, like issues related to heat.

“It is a lot harder for those workers to stand up for themselves and demand the rights that they are entitled to,” she said.

North Carolina’s minimum wage has been $7.25 since 2009. Ripley said the living wage — the minimum income to cover basic needs like food, housing and healthcare — for one person in North Carolina in 2026 is now $20. 

The minimum wage is also an issue for North Carolina Rep. Kanika Brown from Forsyth County. In the past, she has worked with other representatives on bills that would increase the minimum wage to $15, but none have succeeded.

A common argument against a minimum wage increase is that small businesses may not be able to afford it. To Brown, that shouldn’t be the end of the discussion. 

“I understand some businesses and they can’t afford it, but I think sometimes we just have to go back to the table and figure out how we can make it work,” she said.

Brown said the minimum wage impacts other parts of North Carolinian’s quality of life too.

“Rent doubling and tripling in our state, childcare gaps and other things, are related barriers that can be improved by increasing the minimum wage,” Brown said. 

Arleatha Patterson, the community engagement associate for Partnership for Prosperity, a nonprofit that aims to reduce poverty and inaccessibility, works with low-income communities to improve their facilities and resources. 

Patterson said many low-income parents struggle to get to work because their children are under the school-age. According to Patterson, collaboration between nonprofits and government agencies is needed to improve not just childcare, but transportation, license access and more. 

One solution Patterson is exploring in Winston-Salem is study circles, which are powered by Partnership for Prosperity.

These study circles are led by members of low-income areas to create localized action plans. These groups talk about the barriers they face, but also solutions they want to see implemented. 

“They talk about actions that they can participate in, looking for transportation, childcare stipends that can help them, entrepreneurship and other opportunities that can help them supplement the income,” Patterson said.

Many issues are found in North Carolina’s relationship with unions, too. North Carolina AFL-CIO is the biggest labor union in the state. The president, Braxton Winston, believes existing systems benefit the wealthy while workers suffer. 

“It’s an exploitative state where the workers are not benefiting from their work,” Winston said. “Only their bosses are.”

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics reports from September this year, labor is increasing while wages are at record lows. The labor share, the percentage of economic output that goes to workers’ compensation, was at 52.8% —  the lowest recorded value since data was recorded in 1947. Labor productivity is up 1.4%.

AFL-CIO and other labor unions in North Carolina have to contend with right-to-work laws, which prohibit employers and unions from requiring employees to join unions or pay union dues, even if unions are still representing them. 

“It starves unions and makes it difficult for them to operate,” Winston said. 

A prevalent issue in North Carolina is the lack of paid sick, medical and family leave. 

“Workers have to choose between putting food on their table, taking care of a sick loved one,” Winston said. “That shouldn’t be the case.”

Solutions lie with North Carolina’s laws. Rescinding the ban on public sector collective bargaining and right-to-work laws would be a start and recognizing the importance of unions is essential, Winston said.

Rep. Brown said bipartisan support is necessary to implement such solutions. 

“Republicans, Democrats, we have to come to the table,” Brown said. “We have to have bipartisan support and we have to have people, elected officials, that care about the people. That’s number one. They have to care.”