Comments on: New Labor Laws

New Labor Laws

RavinDave — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 01:40:45 -0800

Many of you will lose your overtime benefits today. Welcome to Monday morning!

By: kavasa

kavasa — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 02:26:42 -0800

In other words... The only people that are eligible are the ones under the poverty line. What the hell? These really fuck over people in positions where they'll have to come in on weekends to fix something that broke, or take some work home or whatever, anyone that's commonly under a deadline, etc. I'd like to see the rationale behind these.

By: weston

weston — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 02:32:47 -0800

Especially interesting is the discussion on overtime as an encouragement for job growth -- if you have to pay time and a half to workers doing more than 40 hours per week, your incentive suddenly becomes greater to hire another employee paid at the normal rate. So, eliminating overtime for broad classes of jobs would seem to eliminate a job-creating force.

By: sebas

sebas — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 02:39:54 -0800

So these new rules prevent people from getting payed for overtime? Does it also prevent them from working overtime?

By: Joey Michaels

Joey Michaels — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 02:39:59 -0800

Rule 6: Employees whose job requires imagination, invention, originality, or artistic or creative endeavors are not eligible for overtime. All right, please help me understand this particular rule. It seems a little bizarre.

By: PenDevil

PenDevil — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 02:44:28 -0800

Didn't they try this in France and it failed miserably? I believe that they did away with paying overtime in the hopes of getting employers to hire more people but just wound up with people working overtime for free.

By: Meridian

Meridian — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 03:18:42 -0800

You guys get overtime? I haven't had any overtime benefits for years. Its great for companies since basically you end up working 50 to 60 hours per week and it costs them nothing, and in fact saves them an incredible amount since hiring extra staff is expensive due to the extra overhead. Of course, people will respond with "don't work there". The problem is that this is the situation with most non-government employers now. And its not exactly an employees market, especially as you get older and age discrimination kicks in.

By: stbalbach

stbalbach — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 03:51:33 -0800

I think it will impact the unions the most who have the leverage to force employers to pay overtime. Most normal non union people would have a hard time getting an employer to pay overtime, unless it was allready an internal policy.

By: bashos_frog

bashos_frog — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 05:17:19 -0800

When I worked for AT&T's Downtown Digital, they had an overtime policy that was interesting. There was no overtime unless you worked 12 hours in a day, but then it was retroactive to an 8 hour day. So work 9-11 hours, no overtime. Work 12 hours and you get 4 hours of overtime. I thought it was a pretty good policy, as it paid for really heavy work days, without encouraging people to hang around just for the OT. Of course, since that job required imagination, invention and originality, I'm sure they don't pay anything now.

By: MattD

MattD — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 05:22:21 -0800

Don't forget that the new rules actually close one of the most-often abused holes in the overtime regs, which allow employers to smack a "Manager" nametag on a retail floorworker's smock and deny him overtime, despite his making only $375 a week. Relatively few low-wage workers will be adversely affected by the new regs, because the impact of overtime wages is trivial compared to the impact of an employee having to be paid full benefits -- so the really cheap employers will have the same incentive they always had to keep people well shy of the 40 hour per week mark.

By: substrate

substrate — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 05:31:54 -0800

I haven't received overtime since I quit being a contractor but I personally know a whole bunch of people who are going to be unhappy about this provision: Rule 7: Employees whose main duties are computer-related and involve the implementation, analysis, development, or application of computer systems or designs are also not eligible for overtime. I hope that if their companies decide to strictly adhere to the rules that they stop doing favours for management. A pretty typical one is when there's some required upgrade. It's inconvenient for everybody if it's done during the normal 9-5 workday (which is what they're scheduled as) so they'll do it after hours or on a weekend or on a holiday.

By: nofundy

nofundy — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 05:32:22 -0800

This should be great for union recruitment and bad for W on November 2.

By: a3matrix

a3matrix — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 05:34:25 -0800

Rule 6: Employees whose job requires imagination, invention, originality, or artistic or creative endeavors are not eligible for overtime. All right, please help me understand this particular rule. It seems a little bizarre. Ok Joey, I will translate. The above excerpt, when put through the a3matrixizer translation device reads: Any worker who engages his/her brain in any way will not be paid overtime. Any employer caught encouraging an employee to use his/her brain will face execution. This by order of the most revered W. Ahh, there is rule 7, planting itself firmly in my ass. Not that I ever got overtime, but, there is the official word on it now. I can hear the ovedrtime Nazi now. NO OVERTIME FOR YOU !!!

By: jeremias

jeremias — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 05:41:10 -0800

Rule 6: Employees whose job requires imagination, invention, originality, or artistic or creative endeavors are not eligible for overtime. All right, please help me understand this particular rule. It seems a little bizarre. This relates to the above comment about being called a "sales manager" when what you're really doing is stocking shelves. By law you are paid overtime not by the title of your job but by the type of work you do.

By: jpoulos

jpoulos — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 06:02:28 -0800

Rule 6: Employees whose job requires imagination, invention, originality, or artistic or creative endeavors are not eligible for overtime. Actually, what it means is: "Any employee in a field not dominated by powerful labor unions, which can mobilize their members quickly and get them to vote democract, are not eligible for ovetime."

By: sleslie

sleslie — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 06:17:37 -0800

I'm looking forward to the rehash of this topic on slashdot.

By: pardonyou?

pardonyou? — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 06:33:21 -0800

This article, totally devoid of analysis, is absolutely full of errors and half-truths. The actual impact of this law will be fairly negligible, and there's good reason to believe that because the cap has been raised, more people will gain overtime eligibility than will lose it. Rule 2: Any employee who earns more than $100,000 a year is ineligible for mandated overtime, period. Absolutely, totally wrong. These individuals still have to meet one element of the exemption tests, and still have to be paid on a "salaried basis" -- if they're paid hourly, they're not exempt. Moreover, "blue collar" workers are automatically entitled to overtime, no matter how much they make. Rule 3: Any employee who earns between $23,660 and $100,000 a year, and who is in most executive, professional, or administrative positions, is not eligible for overtime. This does not, however, apply to salespeople. They are still eligible. True, but no significant change from the prior rules. Rule 4: Managers are not entitled to overtime if they oversee two or more people and have the authority to hire, fire, or recommend that someone be hired or fired. True, but no significant change from the prior rules. Rule 5: Administrative employees who have decision-making power and run some sort of operation are not eligible. True. Somewhat different from the prior rules, but mostly the same. The original proposed rules changed this significantly. The old (and now new) standard was "discretion and independent judgment." The proposed standard -- that did not make it to the final rule -- would have exempted those who were in a "position of responsibility." Rule 6: Employees whose job requires imagination, invention, originality, or artistic or creative endeavors are not eligible for overtime. True, but no significant change from the prior rules Rule 7: Employees whose main duties are computer-related and involve the implementation, analysis, development, or application of computer systems or designs are also not eligible for overtime. True. This is a new category, but the vast majority of these employees were exempt under the prior rules. Rule 8: Sales staff that regularly work outside of the employer's place of business are, you guessed it, not eligible either. This is a fairly significant difference. Under prior rules, you had to compare the outside sales employee's duties and time to other employees. That's no longer the case. More of these employees will be exempt. I know it's USA Today, but isn't someone actually fact-checking articles like these?

By: MegoSteve

MegoSteve — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 06:33:36 -0800

I wish someone from the Kerry team would run ads about this issue instead of wasting time on the swiftboat non-issue.

By: smackfu

smackfu — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 06:41:20 -0800

I don't know how many people that computer one would affect. All the programmers I know were already exempt from overtime. This rule changes nothing.

By: Songdog

Songdog — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 06:58:10 -0800

I believe the theory on the imagination/originality bit is that if you work with your hands your supervisors can establish expectations about your work rate and performance. For instance, you can assemble n widgets an hour. If you work with your mind this breaks down. You can't really say that a graphic artist should create two logos a day or finish 9 square inches of illustration per hour (although I'm sure some people do have to live with stuff like that). Sometimes it will take 4 hours to finish a creative task, sometimes it will take 4 days to finish an apparently similar task. I expect that the folks in charge reason speciously that "creatives" should be paid by the task or responsibilities and not by the amount of time it takes to carry them out, which is unpredictable. I work as a software engineer, and therefore fall into the creative category. As a general rule the only programmers who get overtime are the independent consultants, and then only if they have a good contract and didn't necessitate the overtime themselves. I imagine a lot of us would take a pay cut to work predictable hours and qualify for overtime pay. On preview: no kidding smackfu. Who got overtime before?

By: MrMoonPie

MrMoonPie — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 07:02:40 -0800

The Department of Labor has a set of pages on the new regulations.

By: Eekacat

Eekacat — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 07:05:15 -0800

While in my current job, I may not be eligable for overtime anymore, but I don't see that changing any time soon. However, if my job ever gets outsourced (which is a possibility), I am sure that overtime pay will be one of the first things to go. Quite frankly I didn't really see the need for these rule changes. It is good that they closed some of the loopholes for people with "managerial" duties, but what about the rest of us? The bottom line is that the current administration is the biggest anti-worker/pro-corporation cadre to be in power in a long long time. The overtime rules are just one of many policies which erode worker protection.

By: absquatulate

absquatulate — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 07:45:29 -0800

Songdog: I am a full time exempt web developer, but I'm going part-time to go to graduate school in a few weeks. I was hoping on the occasional project for my employer that would get me a few extra hours of overtime to help pay for my health insurance (now that I'm part time, I lose that benefit) but according to this new law, I cannot get that overtime. So this concerns me and my other part-time developer friends. It may not be the norm, but we are out there.

By: Mitheral

Mitheral — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 07:47:55 -0800

Oh it's American rules changing. For a second there I thought Paul Martin had pulled a fast one. And if someone was requiring me to work 60hrs for 40hrs pay I'd quit. At that point your spending way more time working than playing. (168- 60 -(5hrs commuting) - (56 hrs sleeping) = 47 hrs a week for everything else. I don't get overtime pay but i get something even better: time and a half in my time bank.

By: pardonyou?

pardonyou? — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 07:55:58 -0800

I don't get overtime pay but i get something even better: time and a half in my time bank. Which, unfortunately, is not allowed in the U.S. Employees do not have the option of receiving "comp time" in lieu of overtime pay, even if they want it.

By: Songdog

Songdog — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 08:06:57 -0800

absquatulate, I hope I didn't sound like I was downplaying the importance of this; I think it's a really big deal.

By: paddbear

paddbear — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 08:27:54 -0800

If a state's laws favor the employee and also contradict the federal laws on overtime, which law is applied? California's overtime laws were (are?) a lot more generous than the previous and current federal laws.

By: Mars Saxman

Mars Saxman — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 08:30:40 -0800

What is this "overtime" you are all talking about? Never heard of it.

By: JakeEXTREME

JakeEXTREME — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 08:43:15 -0800

Is it me or does it even matter that they raised the lower level for mandatory minimum wage? The people who make that much a year rarely ever see 40 hours in a week anyway, hence why they don't make that much. I see this more of a lower-middle class bust down. The upper class could give two shits less as they never really had these benefits before, and never needed them. Overall these new rules are going to remove overtime pay for more people than it is going to help. Just because you raise a minimum, doesn't mean improvement. Maybe if people would stop saying things like "but no significant change from the prior rules" and really evaluated where the original rules were not useful, then maybe more people would be happy about this. Then again, I'm no finance major or anything.

By: pardonyou?

pardonyou? — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:01:11 -0800

If a state's laws favor the employee and also contradict the federal laws on overtime, which law is applied? The law that is more beneficial to the employee.

By: dash_slot-

dash_slot- — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:02:59 -0800

Wow. Unimaginable here in Blighty. I've never had a job in which rules like this would apply: I've worked managerial in retail & catering, front-line social services, office work in banking & insurance, warehouse work, multi-drop deliveries... Workers may offer extra hours in return for time of in lieu of pay - that is quite common here. Managers, in my experience in retail, arrange their own schedules, so O/T isn't an issue - they remain until the necessary tasks are done - but they wouldn't generally ask their staff to work for free. They'd be greeted with a bemusement or incomprehension. What is the incentive to climb the greasy pole, if you end up with less control over your work than when you were a drone [very badly mixed metaphors - but I am outraged on your behalf...]? Still, this is the other side of the coin that US mefites tell us about - y'know, the enterprise culture, it's ok to have i or 2 weeks holidays per year, fire at will states. Kerry could pick up some low hanging fruit here, d'ya think? I don't get overtime pay but i get something even better: time and a half in my time bank. on preview: Which, unfortunately, is not allowed in the U.S. Employees do not have the option of receiving "comp time" in lieu of overtime pay, even if they want it. posted by pardonyou? at 7:55 AM PST on August 23 Why not?

By: alumshubby

alumshubby — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:08:07 -0800

If I won't be paid overtime, I wonder if this means I can refuse to work for free. Tshhyeahright.

By: pardonyou?

pardonyou? — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:24:08 -0800

Why not? Literally, because the law doesn't allow it (except, I should note, for state and local government employees). As a question of policy, that's a good question. A bill gets introduced almost every year to allow this, but has yet to pass. If I won't be paid overtime, I wonder if this means I can refuse to work for free. Technically, if you're on a salary, you're not "working for free." The logic behind the exemptions is that people are compensated more highly with the understanding that the type of work they do may routinely entail more than 40 hours of work a week, and that is built into the salary.

By: ilsa

ilsa — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:30:47 -0800

I have been railing against this thing since the first I heard about it. I have written my Congresscritters. I have blogged. I have told people. I am disgusted. No matter how you slice this thing, more people will lose eligibilty than gain it. Several people have mentioned that this is a disinsentive to job creation. Yeah, some people would walk off the job if they were forced to routinely work 60 hour weeks (particularly unpaid). Most of us don't have a choice. We work when the boss tells us to, because we need the job. The ironic thing is that most people do better work when they aren't dog tired from working those kind of hours. Oh, and dash-slot, the reason "comp time" is illegal (but widely practiced anyway) is that it is highly prone to abuse. Say Lumbergh makes you work 8 hours overtime this week. That would "entitle" you to a day and a half off next week. Except that he needs you in the office next week, or he wouldn't have made you work all day Saturday. You can have that time off when he darn well feels like it, assuming you remember to pester him mercilessly about it. How does the week after hell freezes over sound?

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:35:20 -0800

I don't get overtime pay but i get something even better: time and a half in my time bank. Thought Bush was pushing a similar thing above. Instead of overtime, paid time off would be given.

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:41:21 -0800

I spent the past month house-hunting. I noticed that most lower-mid- to middle-mid-income homes, and some upper-mid-income homes, have rental suites in them now. In the 1970s, my father supported a family of four on a single paycheck. In the 1980s, two income-earners were required to live a moderate lifestyle in a moderate home. In the 2000s, it looks like it takes two income-earners plus a tenant in order to live in a nice home. What the hell happened to "The Third Wave"?!

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:42:46 -0800

Yeah, some people would walk off the job if they were forced to routinely work 60 hour weeks (particularly unpaid). Though I know many people working management positions that do this which makes them an exempt employee - or the salary worker. During the slower times some companies also allow their exempt employees to work a few hours a day without having to use their vacation time.

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 09:54:44 -0800

This enforces the Corporate's idea; you are management or expandable. In the corporate world, any members familiar with "green belts" or "black belts"?

By: amberglow

amberglow — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 10:04:59 -0800

what are green and black belts? This is yet another gift to corporations by Bush--they've been lobbying for this change for years--when do we normal people get gifts? I haven't gotten overtime for years and years, but our assistants may lose theirs now because of this, and they need the cash, believe me.

By: goethean

goethean — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 10:26:59 -0800

when do we normal people get gifts? You got a $700 tax cut, which you get to pay back, with interest, over the next few decades. You also got the uniquely patriotic feeling that comes from knowing that your country is killing Arabs.

By: psmealey

psmealey — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 10:28:29 -0800

From a certain perspective, this is self-defeating. My wife used to work as an executive assistant at a Big Six accounting firm. By company policy, all administrative staff are paid hourly and are not eligible for performance bonuses. Routinely, the sr. staff (who, with incentives, make several multiples of what admin staff gets) would demand that admin staff stay long after work to support documentation efforts, mailings, etc. This was always at the expense of personal or family time. When administrative staff balked, the response from the professional was the invariably snotty, "what are you complaining about, you get time and a half for staying late!" Somewhat galling when you consider that this comes from someone who is making $150k-$250k per year on up, and you are making $25k-$35k as a lowly prole. With this new law, such folks get no OT pay. No OT pay means decreased incentive to stay late, and more resistance to actually doing it, which results in lower productivity. This isn't to say that companies can't continue to pay Time and a Half if they think they will continue to provide incentive and proper compensation to relatively low paid employees to put in extra hours, but human nature (of corp mgmt) being what it is, they probably won't, and it will end up costing them more in the long run.

By: mrgrimm

mrgrimm — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 10:32:32 -0800

What the hell happened to "The Third Wave"?! yeah, no domes either. wtf? i was hoping to get a house for $50K by now. the future sucks.

By: kindall

kindall — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 10:54:28 -0800

according to this new law, I cannot get that overtime Well, sure you can. The law doesn't ban your employer from paying you extra for overtime. It merely does not require them to pay you overtime. You probably won't get it, but the law doesn't forbid it.

By: Joey Michaels

Joey Michaels — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 10:58:05 -0800

Songdog et al: Thanks for answering my question re: Rule #6. It makesome sense now.

By: pardonyou?

pardonyou? — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 11:15:37 -0800

No matter how you slice this thing, more people will lose eligibilty than gain it. That's simply not true. The fact is that nobody really knows for sure. Some studies suggest that more than twice as many people will gain overtime than will lose it. This makes intuitive sense to me, since the biggest difference is the increase in the threshold. I will also tell you that my company, with 80,000 U.S. employees, is not changing one person's status as a result of these regulations. That's how insignificant the changes are.

By: dash_slot-

dash_slot- — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 11:27:03 -0800

From a libertarian perspective, why should [local/state/federal] government concern themselves with private contracts between corporations and workers?

By: Vidiot

Vidiot — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 11:57:43 -0800

This is scary. I could reasonably be considered a "creative" worker, yet I'm eligible for OT. I don't work it all the time, but every now and then, I'm on the road, working 18+ hour days. I think that if you bust your ass for the company, they should accordingly compensate you more. (Some co-workers of mine make more money in OT than their base salary.) No one wants to ask HR or any other corporate managers how this will affect us.

By: quonsar

quonsar — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 12:18:07 -0800

U.S. Employees do not have the option of receiving "comp time" in lieu of overtime pay, even if they want it. bullshit. for 12 years i timebanked all my overtime.

By: quonsar

quonsar — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 12:20:01 -0800

except, I should note, for state and local government employees ah. never mind.

By: mkhall

mkhall — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 12:26:27 -0800

I have some knowledge of a particular national retailer. One of the larger impacts this has had is in their merchandise buying offices, where the tradition has been to hire fresh-faced college kids and make them work 60+ hours a week (on salary) to prove themselves. With the new guidelines this comes crashing down, as overtime for assistant buyers is not going to be approved. The hue and cry in the hallways is that the senior level buyers are now going to have to shoulder all the extra workload themselves. This actually turns out to be a boon for the in-house IT staff, who've now been challenged to develop applications to reduce the buyers' workload. Ironically enough, to get this job done quickly, IT's overtime has been approved.

By: psmealey

psmealey — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 12:36:07 -0800

From a libertarian perspective, why should [local/state/federal] government concern themselves with private contracts between corporations and workers? Good thing the libertarians weren't in control in the good old days of child labor and the 7 day work week. The answer is because workers have no power in that relationship, and sometimes you need to create laws to protect individuals from the on occasion systematic abuses by the powerful.

By: Mitheral

Mitheral — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 12:37:52 -0800

Well around here when your bank gets more than 120hrs in it they start getting ansy because you can then give your 4 weeks notice and walk out the door with the remainder in your jeans. Say I have 160hrs of time in my bank. I can give my notice thursday afternoon, not come in friday and collect an extra weeks weeks pay for my trouble. I'm in that zone so I'm getting a lot of encourgement to make weekends long weekends.

By: eatitlive

eatitlive — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 12:56:11 -0800

Good thing the libertarians weren't in control in the good old days of child labor and the 7 day work week. They just weren't called Libertarians back then. In the early 20th century, U.S. government was completely laissez-faire with labor/employer "contracts." But by the time of the Great Depression, the country had been pushed to the verge of a socialist revolution. That's the context in which our labor law was framed. It's a capitalist's version of socialist reform, meant to stop the proles from complaining, but also to keep them working. My question is, what's the Republican spin on this? Sure, this law increases the minimum standard for overtime, but if it's at anyone's expense, it's the middle class. This is a complete reversal of their established routine of robbing the poor to give to the middle. How do you play this off in the rust belt?

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 13:03:22 -0800

what are green and black belts? which adds "job security" to a position in a company that looks at their employees as management or outsource.

By: psmealey

psmealey — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 13:23:17 -0800

Six Sigma: Buzzword Training to Help Enhance Your Job Security

By: psmealey

psmealey — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 13:35:12 -0800

Sorry for the cynicism, I should explain about snarkily trashing one of the great management gems of St. Jack (Welch). I have managed several large technology integration projects with a bunch of Six Sigma people. Some were quite gifted and others were as dumb as a bag of hammers (the usual cross-section of middle management people). I am about as quantitative as they come in terms of my ops management foundation and approach, but I really didn't see that those folks had a leg up on anyone else on the team, just a specific vernacular.

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 13:41:31 -0800

This is a complete reversal of their established routine of robbing the poor to give to the middle. How do you play this off in the rust belt? They're not robbing the poor, just making you a poor manager. Any links to what was originally proposed?

By: jmd82

jmd82 — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 14:19:27 -0800

he people who make that much a year rarely ever see 40 hours in a week anyway, hence why they don't make that much. However, if you take a typical low-level worker at $8/hr at 40 hours/week for 52 weeks, that comes up to $16,640- which would not have qualified under the old rules where the treshold is $13,000/year. To break the treshold for the new values, you have to make more than $11.375/hr. To the low class, I would reckon that is a significant hourly rate, but maybe living in a college town has altered my reality. Question: does the OT pay contribute to the $455/week cap? Also, when calculating eligibility for OT, do tips and commission count? Does the actual time and a half from OT count? Also, the article lists both the weekly and yearly cap. Does the law require use of the weekly cap or the yearly cap? For example, say a worker earns $800 one week and $300 the next week. Overall, that averages out to over $455/week, but they are making below $300 a week once. Any idea how all that actually works out for determining a person's eligability for OT?

By: skallas

skallas — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 14:57:57 -0800

>government concern themselves with private contracts between corporations and workers? Or better yet between the criminal and the victim? Sheez, why am I paying for a cop's salary, union no less! "Ya shoulda had a gun on ya!" How about the entire history of all industrialized fucking nations for one? Child labor, machines that maim and kill with no recourse, voting how your boss tells you, taking work home, getting your wife and kids to finish your "extra" work for you, etc.

By: Sonny Jim

Sonny Jim — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 15:20:10 -0800

industrialized fucking nations Now there's a disturbing image.

By: amberglow

amberglow — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 15:34:10 -0800

that sounds weird, thomcat, but whatever works, i guess. and the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire is said to be one of the events that started labor laws becoming real in this country. It's a sin it took horrible deaths for employers to start treating their employees like human beings (under duress, and still not as widespread as you might think--see that "locking-in" thing at walmart, sweatshops, etc).

By: Quinbus Flestrin

Quinbus Flestrin — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 16:44:09 -0800

From a libertarian perspective, why should [local/state/federal] government concern themselves with private contracts between corporations and workers? For that matter, why should goverment concern themselves with the enforcement of private contracts? Why should we bother to pay for all those courts and lawyers just to benefit the private parties entering into the contracts, let them fight it out in private. The main reason for creating regulations for labor practices is that the parties are not necessarily negotiating from positions of equal strength. "Sign this or don't work (or eat)," is a real possibility in any economy with a significant level of unemployment.

By: dash_slot-

dash_slot- — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 19:42:25 -0800

skallas - chill out. I was playing devil's advocate. I am no libertarian, not by a long way. I would like workers in the states to have better terms of employment. All work and no play. You guys are fairly hard done by, compared to us in EUland.

By: Keyser Soze

Keyser Soze — Mon, 23 Aug 2004 20:29:23 -0800

Well, thats another excuse for me to go to the Air Force. It is looking better and better as the administration gets closer to election time. Believe me, I will vote.

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Tue, 24 Aug 2004 09:51:36 -0800

18 States will not be effected by this because of their State's Labor laws. The result from this will be seen many years later down the road. Keyser, their are Corporations that profit billions of dollars a year. If you had a management position in those companies your pay would have been structured like this before Bush's administration.

By: thomcatspike

thomcatspike — Tue, 24 Aug 2004 09:52:23 -0800

their = there