Governor JB Pritzker Signs Nation's First Algorithmic Workplace Productivity Transparency Act

CHICAGO — Governor JB Pritzker signed Public Act 104-0388 into law on Monday, enacting the nation's first comprehensive Algorithmic Workplace Productivity Transparency Act, establishing statutory guardrails governing how commercial employers in logistics warehousing, call centers, and delivery services utilize artificial intelligence and algorithmic monitoring tools to evaluate, discipline, or terminate employees.

The legislation, supported by labor unions, worker centers, and legal aid federations, requires employers to provide workers with written explanations of all automated surveillance and productivity scoring algorithms, while explicitly prohibiting speed quotas that interfere with statutory meal breaks, rest periods, or bathroom access.

Protecting Warehouse and Service Workers from Abusive Automated Quotas Logistics warehouse workers and customer service representatives increasingly work under algorithmic tracking systems that measure "time off task" down to the second, penalizing employees who pause to stretch or drink water, driving workplace injury rates in automated fulfillment centers to twice the private industry average.

"Technology in the workplace should empower workers, not subject them to constant, dehumanizing surveillance and impossible speed quotas that lead to severe injuries," Governor Pritzker said during a bill signing at a union training center in Chicago. "Public Act 104-0388 ensures that Illinois workers are treated with basic human dignity, mandating complete transparency in automated scoring systems, protecting essential rest breaks, and ensuring automated algorithms cannot secretly fire hardworking men and women."

Key Worker Protections Under Public Act 104-0388 Under the enacted law:

• Mandatory Algorithmic Disclosures: Employers must provide newly hired workers with plain-language descriptions of all biometric, keystroke, and video surveillance tools used for productivity evaluation.
• Ban on Unsafe Speed Quotas: Employers cannot establish productivity quotas that penalize workers for taking statutory meal breaks or using restroom facilities.
• Right to Contest Algorithmic Disciplines: Employees facing disciplinary action or termination generated by an algorithm have a statutory right to human review and complete access to underlying tracking telemetry.

Labor leaders, workplace safety advocates, and employment law scholars commended the landmark statute, noting that Illinois is establishing the national model for ethical artificial intelligence governance in the workplace.