I work as a diesel mechanic for a chain of midwest shops and was immediately "triggered" by this article because its been an on-and-off part of my career for 15

I work as a diesel mechanic for a chain of midwest shops and was immediately "triggered" by this article because its been an on-and-off part of my career for 15 years now. Ive had shops where I wasnt paid, and told to just 'take it out as vacation.' ive also had shops that cut me a check that bounces, and shops that cut me a check only to issue a "stop payment" a few months later because well, the shop got taken to court for secretly running a car theft ring. "evaporating" paychecks are caused by a judge telling the accountants to quit paying everyone ASAP. I only got that paycheck 4 years after we were all fired, and only because the state labor board stepped in. For around 3 years I only accepted cash for my work, which is a legal request to make in most states despite what the boss tells you. now for coal companies...thats a weird beast in itself. We had a contract last spring to service a fleet of XDE240s and showed up with everything we needed. cranes, hydraulics, an entire mobile shop for maintenance and transport, and were told 2 months into the work that they never authorized the work. we presented our bill of lading, contracts, and signed invoices and they never responded. We decided this must have been a mistake, so we completed the work and returned the vehicles expecting payment. The entire company was run by a paranoid elderly southerner who had died that year in a gun accident, and the work site was basically abandoned. We waited 3 months for a judge to start liquidating his assets before his kids returned from Europe and demanded his estate. Long story short we got about 70% of the payment, and ended up with the rest after the trucks and most of the old mans estate were auctioned.