My son was upset when he returned home from his minimum wage job at a local grocery store. Seems he was confronted with, “The assistant manager is hopping mad about something you did,” as soon as he entered the door. His mind raced. What had he done? He took a breath, composed himself, and headed toward her office.
And she was mad. Turns out my son — who is new to the job — had taken only a 15-minute break instead of the state-mandated 30-minute break on three separate occasions — an offense the assistant manager said could cost the store $10,000 per occurrence, $30,000 in all.
He said he wasn’t aware of the break rule. Regardless, the manager added three minor violations to his personnel file.
At home, my son couldn’t understand what happened. He hadn’t cheated anyone or stolen anything. He had simply punched back in after only 15 minutes in the break room.
“Son,” I said, “Welcome to the surreal world of fascialism.”
In his book, Vampire Economy: Doing Business Under Fascism, Günter Reimann details life under the German version of fascism. We live under the Progressive version, aptly named fascialism — a little softer, but just as evil and nonsensical.
You know, you can tell a teenager about the ills of government interventions and think you are hitting home. But a real example — in the face of an angry assistant manager — is much more effective.
Liberty won one more this evening.
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As a grocery worker no such law as a Federal mandated law a 8 hr shift has two 15 minute breaks a state law states a 30 minute lunch period!
Russ,
Corrected. Thanks
No breaks are required by federal law. The issue at hand is whether break time is compensable time. In some cases it is, in others, it isn’t. The Dept. of Labor’s somewhat helpful primer can be found here:
http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/workhours/breaks.htm
Typically, employers worry that employees will work during unpaid breaks. This can potentially lead an employer to run afoul of the law in several ways:
1) Because of greater duration of work, but equal pay, the employee may earn less than the minimum wage.
2) Because the employee’s work week is now longer than forty hours, the employer may fail to pay overtime when required. Failure to pay overtime is illegal regardless of the base wage; it is against the law even in the case that the employee’s base pay far exceeds the minimum wage.
Many employers attempt to get around this issue by paying employees a salary. Although their compensation must be greater than the minimum wage, salaried employees do not earn overtime. However, the varieties of work that can be paid on a salary basis are limited by law. They are: executive, administrative, professional, computer and outside sales employees. Despite the best intentions of employers, if the DOL determines that a salaried employee is not primarily involved in the defined tasks, then the employer can be required to pay back pay, overtime and penalties for time worked during breaks.
Laws on breaks vary by state. A summary of state break laws can be found here, but I can’t vouch for its accuracy.
http://www.ewin.com/articles/restper.htm
As mentioned later in this blog, it’s also an issue for the court system. There’s a story of a worst case scenario with this sort of thing: A union had created a 5 minute cigarette break in their contract. Most of the workers didn’t smoke and there was no point in taking the break. As a result, they just kept working. Who would stop for 5 minutes…..
Fast forward 30 years later and the union sues the company for 30 years of missed 5-minute breaks at an overtime rate. The lawsuit came out in the millions.
It’s mind boggling, but it’s super common. Back in the day, I had co-workers in various jobs who were fired for similar time clock issues. Not being late or leaving early – but by not taking a break or not watching the minutes *precisely* enough after lunch. Which, of course, sends the very clear message to workers that we’re not here primarily to produce and make money/products – we’re here to comply with regulations first and foremost. Those most “in compliance” employees are therefore the best workers and will keep their jobs. But when the State is increasingly ratcheting up the fines and hitting ever harder, no wonder we get such bizarre business behavior.
I’m convinced that socialism makes no sense to children. It gets indoctrinated/socialized/brainwashed into them in their teenage and early adult years. It’s “naturally fair” that people are rewarded for success, penalized for failure, and charity is the mechanism by which the successful help out those less fortunate. Instead, we live in a society that punishes success, rewards failure, and replaces the moral norm of charity with that of obligation and entitlement. Surely a brain has to be reprogrammed to rationalize that. Thus the reason why the fight over control of our children’s education has become so important.
A lifetime in public schools and being force fed government/corporate propaganda has a tendency to negate common sense and destroy the perception that moral outrage and personal convictions have any value or is even anything but a fantasy. A child learns that a ‘adult’ mind is one without imagination or moral compass and focuses only on the ‘practical’ as defined by authority figures.
As far as the mechanics go…
Socialism works because the government is able to garner support by forcing a minority of the population into providing ‘benefits’ for the majority of the population. The child-like mind is easily swayed by bribery and false promises. The adult public at large lacks the sophistication to understand lost opportunity costs and cannot perceive the fact that the government is stealing from their future much more then they will ever receive in the future.
Democratic socialism is even more effective because even though you may end up on the side that is being fucked, and understand that you are being fucked, there is always the hope that one day you will rise up, gain political strength, and be one of the fuckers. Thus it destroys the political resistance of the ‘producer class’.
To put it another way:
In the same way that violence begets violence; High levels of corruption in Democratic governments breed hope in the ‘producer class’ that one day that they too can benefit from the corruption. Which, certainly, many producers manage to achieve.
This is how Democratic socialism is able to function despite the obvious shortcomings and the resulting rapid-fire escalation of immorality and violence of the system. This is why ‘mega’ corporations, the ones politically connected, can support destroying the economies they depend on while the majority of the population happily goes along with it… their heads full of lies and eyes lit up with the promise of false hope and false redemption.
Produce and be successful and your vilified and penalized. Produce nothing and be a failure and your a victim to be rewarded. It sounds like Atlas is Shrugging. Show us the way to Galt’s Gulch.
Chris: I couldn’t agree with you more. I don’t believe humans are born with an innate understanding of socialism. Quite the contrary. What’s one of the first lessons that adults/teachers attempt to teach kids? “You have to learn how to share.” I’m not suggesting that sharing, in itself, is a bad thing. I’m just saying that it’s a concept that most children have to be taught – over and over and over. And I think they have such a tough time with the idea simply because they’re able to see, so easily, how fundamentally unfair “forced” sharing really is.
nate-m: You are soooooo right. And that’s exactly why the socialist-controlled government education system is burning cash and tying itself in knots to block all of the new school free-choice alternatives being proposed in different states right now. I always thought education — *real* education — was based on asking tough questions and employing critical thinking.
Libertarian Jerry: I’ve been hearing Galt whispering in my ear for years now but I must not be ready because he hasn’t actually come for me yet!
That’s why I am accumulating gold & silve coins. When the dollar is worthless I will be John Galt.
Please join in, we’re gonna need all the help we can get.
And a lot of companies use minor break/lunch infractions as a quick means to fire people.
If they need to reduce staff or costs you get called in and written up for break/lunch time violations. So now you are fired and left with a bad work record.
Another example of “government always accomplishes the opposite of the STATED goal.”
Well, it is never good practice for the glass guy to hire the ruffian to break the shoe guy’s window directly.
There is no need for a new word “fascialism”. Just call it what it is, fascism or Progressive Fascism.
Definition: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism
Etymology: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=fascist
=== ===
From Italian fascio “group, association,” lit. “bundle” (see fasces from the Latin). Fasci are “groups of men organized for political purposes”, a feature of Sicily since c.1895, and the 20c. The totalitatrian sense probably came directly from this, but influenced by the Roman fasces, which became the party symbol.
=== ===
Fasces (Latin/Roman fascis) is a bundle. A bundle of wooden sticks with an axe blade emerging from the center, an image of summary power and jurisdiction, and “strength through unity”.
I hate that word as well. Fascialism? Isn’t that something out of a porno?
It’s not enough to simply have a company policy dictating lunch breaks and what-not. Employers have to enforce those breaks. If I tell an employee, “Susie, you have to take a 30 minute lunch and you can’t do any work on during that time,” and Susie decides to eat lunch and work at her desk, as an employer, I’m still on the hook for any violation of the wage and hour laws and are subject to potentially business-ending penalties and back pay. I have to tell Susie to leave her desk or not do any work while on her lunch break. Same with going home in the afternoon. I have to tell Susie to go home. The only way to protect myself in such a situation is to place warnings in their personnel file. Even then, I’m not fully protected. The federal government has succeeded in making a very adversarial relationship between employee and employer. As much as I would like to treat my employees as rational, thinking human beings, I can’t.
I had occasion several years ago to spend half a day being lectured by a local grunt from the wage and hour administration on my duties and responsibilities as an employer. A former disgruntled employee turned me in because I hadn’t paid her time and a half on the overtime hours she worked. Honestly, I didn’t know I was supposed to. After spending several hours going over publication after publication of wage and hour laws and regulations, the wage and hour grunt inquired as to my annual gross sales. At the time, they were around $300,000 which put me under the $500,000 amount under which the federal government could insert itself into my affairs. Realizing that he had no jurisdiction, he turned to the old standby of interstate commerce asking if any of my employees performed interstate commerce. I replied, no. He then asked me if any of my employees did any of the following:
1. run credit card transactions over a phone line
2. receive or make phone calls from an out of state source
3. read or send emails from someone out of state (whether directly addressed to them or not)
Any of those things qualified as interstate commerce and while my business didn’t do interstate commerce, that employee would be covered by the wage and hour laws because they performed “interstate commerce”. I replied that I, and no one else, did each of those things. At that point, he explained that once I hit the $500,000 mark in annual gross sales that we would be bound by the laws and regulations contained within the wage and hour act(s).
It’s very challenging to be a small business owner nowadays.
That is the signal which the government is sending these days. “Don’t grow too big. Don’t hire too many workers. Because, you won’t know what will be taken from you, under penalty of criminal laws, if you become too greedy and build too big a business.”
It amazes me that the average person does not understand how these government policies stunt their economic futue.
I wonder if we can all arrange our businesses so that ‘employees’ are ‘independent contractors’ who simply ‘hire’ the floor space from us to do their work from? You’d have to get all the employees on side, but I imagine it could be done. Or you could simply ‘bet’ each person that they won’t work for you between set hours, and give them theirs wagers when you lose the bet?
Don’t know how it works in the US, but where I live (Brazil), that is a relatively common thing. Brazilians are tauted “one of the most enterprising people around” because of the large number of registered companies, but a sizeable fraction of those enterprises consists of one single individual (the owner), who is then hired as a “company”, and not as a “person”.
There are some advantages to doing that in terms of taxation (essentially, companies pay less taxes than people), and some disadvantages.
However, the Brazilian government doesn’t like this, so there are some court decisions that say that if someone works regular hous and takes orders from company A, company A is responsible for him, even if the guy is an employee of company B. (I’m making it simple and cutting some details, but you get the idea).
No need to over-analyze this. Orwell – the purpose of power is power. This is why these unaccountable bureaucracies are so destructive. Then companies are blamed for taking their businesses overseas. If you want to see how bad things are, Google to find out what Federal Regulations have to be complied with fro McDonald’s to serve up tomato ketchup.
Though I mentioned some legal problems above, I don’t know if this is necessarily a libertarian issue.
If you signed a contract to work X amount of hours for X amount of dollars, then that’s how the contract should be treated. It’s great if an employee wants to work extra. But, I’ve also seen cases where an employer begins to push his boundaries by asking workers to forgo lunch or come in a little early on a regular basis without compensation. It can slowly turn into a situation where the employer is not respecting the contract agreed upon with the worker. If you signed up to work 8 hours a week for X dollars per week, it’s not a great situation if you find yourself working 8.5 hours a week for the same amount.
Of course, an employer can hire or fire if he or she wishes, but nonetheless, the terms of employment should be laid out at the beginning of a job. The employer shouldn’t offer someone $7.25 per hour for 8 hours when you really mean to pay them $6.82 for 8.5 hours of work.
So, there’s another way of looking at it too. If two parties agree on a certain transaction, one party shouldn’t feel obligated to go beyond that contract and offer free services. And being strict about work times is a way to respect contracts rather than regulations, which is a very libertarian principle.
Contracts are a touchy subject in libertarian theory. Some people define a libertarian society as a society of contract, but the Rothbardian approach in particular places greater emphasis on the conservation of property rights than in “contract worship”.
In your above example, the person who’s being over-worked and under-paid would be perfectly free to break the contract. Even if there was no breach of its clauses by either party, they both could give up the arrangement without any legal consequences, as long as the property of neither party was damaged by the breaking. Of course there are other dimensions to the issue, such as trust and expectations, but those are more complicated, and it’s time for me to go home before I break any work time regulations.
I’m by no means an expert on the issue, so if any of the above is wrong, please point it out.
In California most employment contracts are “at will” – they may terminated at any time with or without reason, with or without notice. That being said, there are still State and Federal Employment laws that have to be observed – you can not fire someone because of pregnancy; if you shut down a plant employing more than a certain number of people, you have to give 60 days notice.
Yes, it’s a strange grey area. Because on the one hand, you can quit or fire someone for any reason. The contract can usually be revoked by the employer at any time. It’s your business after all. However, on the other hand, you should be truthful in the original contract over the nature of the agreement.
This could be an area closer related to business ethics rather than libertarian theory. Can you promise an employee one rate, but then pay them slightly less through more hours? Yes, you can. But should you act in such a way as a decent and ethical person? Probably not.
Next epiphanic moment for this young lad: when he gets his first pay check and finds out how much the government(s) have already confiscated from it.
Well, how else are you going to pay the people who come up with and enforce these ridiculous laws?
Record low youth employment/work participation in this country–you can’t blame the youth! When I was a kid (12 or 13 in the early 80′s), I mowed lawns to earn cash for my discretionary purchases and stock market investments. Nowadays, a young person can’t even mow the lawn according to the U.S. Department of Labor, and I quote:
“14- and 15-Year-Olds MAY NOT Be Employed in: … 8. Occupations involved with the operating, tending, setting up, adjusting, cleaning, oiling or repairing or of ANY POWER-DRIVEN MACHINERY, including, but not limited to, lawnmowers, golf carts, all-terrain vehicles, trimmers, cutters, weed-eaters, edgers, food slicers, food grinders, food choppers, food processors, food cutters, and food mixers. Fourteen- and 15-year-olds may operate most office machinery and those machines that are expressly…”
Available at: http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/childlabor101_text.htm#4
So junior, the next time, a parasitic boomer (grand)parent is complaining about the Gen Y (or Z?) youth being “lazy.” Go ahead and give them a lecture on the parasitic nanny state they’ve helped propagate.
If don’t want to dance the tune, if freedom from this bullshit is important to you, then consider working underground, off the books, for cash and barter, moving to a right to work state that has no laws governing breaks, meals, hours worked for people 16+. FInd people who are willing to work this way with you. Live a more simple, less expensive life. It’s being done by more people than you can imagine.
Pardon the missing “you” in the opening sentence.
Be careful – Big Brother is not going to like this. As more and more people chose to opt out, draconian measures will be taken to discourage non-compliance. In the old USSR, people who chose not to comply were either shot, or sent to labor camps. Crimes such as smuggling oranges and profiteering were considered as subversive activity and punishable by death.
I sent this to a few friends because in the past we discussed how stupid it was for France to pass a law that said no worker could work more than 40 hours each week. We are no longer laughing at the French. Two of my friends wrote back to tell me that they have sons who faced exactly the same thing. It appears to be common practice.
We could all be more successful working for ourselves in such an environment but then all of the wonderful efficiencies of the division of labor would pass away. It is amazing how the government seems to strive to destroy the market’s ability to provide goods and services for no gain whatsoever. It seems to be a war on prosperity and happiness. It is the government finding fantasy exploitation then punishing those they fantisize about being exploited. It is truly insane.
Here is a solution. Let your children leave the USA. Let them travel and learn about other countries by going over there. Sure, they may not come back. They may like the expat life. In that case chances are that they are not being ruined by the silliness the article author’s son experienced- not on a daily basis anyway.
Fact is many I’ve met in the USA are parochial and utterly ignorant about anything outside the borders of the USA. For example, on one occasion I was informed by the local “expert” that New Zealand was located adjacent to Finland. Another enjoyable time was listening to the claim that the Sydney Harbour Bridge joined New Zealand to Australia. Amazing! Breathtaking idiocy! That such lunatics exist and are taken seriously througout the USA speaks volumes. That they hold seriously responsible and powerful positions is outstanding. Really amazed me that did. They got authority. These two (one male and one female) had power over other people and they they were willfully ignorant. Given the chance they’ll march your kids off to the front for no particular reason that makes any sense.
Before the imbeciles ruin your young get your young on a long OE (overseas experience). Don’t delay it. It may be too late for you, but give the young ones the opportunity to escape the imbecility that could wreck their future and sadden their lives.
Sione
You should see the look on people’s faces when I inform them that the only 2 good experiences I (the meekest law abiding citizen ever) ever had with law enforcement were in Beijing and Nanchang.
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