During the government of Porfirio Diaz (1876 to 1911), the land was virtually the only source of wealth in Mexico and was concentrated in the hands of a small sector of society, leading to the exploitation of workers in the field. Working hours were at least 14 hours a day and very low wages, men, women and children were involved in sub-human conditions.

After assuming the Presidency of the Republic, as a result of the armed revolutionary movement of 1910, Francisco I. Madero declared on December 18th, 1911, the creation of the Department of Labor, within the then Secretariat of Promotion, Colonization and Industry, to resolve labor disputes under a scheme mostly conciliatory.

In 1915, during the government of Venustiano Carranza, the Labor Department joined the Interior Secretary, and a draft law was elaborated on labor contract. Two years later, the Political Constitution was enacted in the United States of Mexico, and decreed the following rights of workers in its Article 123:

• The setting of maximum working time of eight hours.
• The compensation for unfair dismissal.
• The right to organize and strike.
• The establishment of standards for Forecasting and Social Welfare.

The Federal Conciliation and Arbitration Board
The very nature of the federal system caused problems in interpreting constitutional provisions in cases that transcended the geographical scope of the states.

Faced with that situation, in 1927 the Federal Conciliation and Arbitration Board (JFCA) was created as the competent authority to resolve labor disputes at the federal level. It was integrated by an equal number of representatives of employers, workers and government, through the then Secretariat of Industry, Trade and Labor.

The first Federal Labor Law was published on August 27th, 1931; consequently, President Abelardo Rodriguez gave full autonomy to the Department of Labor, with a set of clearly defined responsibilities, which include the following:

1. Monitor compliance of the Federal Labor Law.
2. Find solutions to labor disputes through conciliation.
3. Develop a policy of social security and inspection.
4. Create joint committees and other Preventive and conciliators organizations.

In spite of its autonomy, over the years, the Labor Department's structure no longer responded to the characteristics and complexity of the labor sector. Thus, the President Manuel Ávila Camacho in 1940 enacted a new law of Secretaries of State, which ruled that the Labor Department became the Secretariat of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS), which structure and organization would respond to the social demands, product of the evolution of the sector and the development of the national labor movement.

The Federal Bureau for the Defense of Labor The aforementioned developments led to a series of changes in the workplace at many levels, among others: the establishment of new rights of working women; modification to the system for setting wages and profit distribution, and the federalization of various industrial segments. All this led the issuance of the Rules of the Federal Bureau for the Defense of Labor on June 2, 1975, as a decentralized organism of the STPS, with sufficient capacity and autonomy to monitor compliance of the existing labor legislation, and to guarantee the defense of workers.

Subsequently, the Congress revoked the law of Secretaries of State and during the administration of José López Portillo, published a new Organic Law of the Federal Public Administration, published in the Diario Oficial on December 29th, 1976. Such legislation has redefined the powers of the STPS, as described below.

Agencies of the Labor Sector January 17th, 1977 the President decreed that the following agencies would fall under the coordination of the Secretariat of Labor and Social Walfare.

• The National Commission on Minimum Wages (Conasami), established on November 21st, 1962.
• The National Joint Committee for the Protection of Wages (CONAMPROS), created on April 3rd, 1974.
• The Guarantee and Promotion Fund for the Consumption of Workers (Fonacot), created on May 2nd, 1974.

Throughout the years, the Internal Regulations of the STPS have been modified to meet the evolving needs of the legal administrative labor sector, and to reorient the functional structure of the unit to the priorities of the Head of the Federal Executive. The current Internal Regulations of the STPS were published on November 14, 2008, in the Diario Oficial de la Federación (Official Gazette).