# I wish companies would actually learn labor laws

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-wish-companies-would-actually-learn-labor-laws/719053>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [May 1, 2015, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-wish-companies-would-actually-learn-labor-laws/719053 "2015-05-01T23:34:01Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\
**Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-wish-companies-would-actually-learn-labor-laws/719053/21 "2015-05-02T14:24:19Z")

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> [@Flyer](#):
>
> That’s true. But you’re missing the point of my OP.
> 
> Every company I’ve known about claims that the law requires a certain thing – but what each company claims that the law requires contradicts what other companies claim that the law requires.
> 
> Take the first two points in my original list. A company that has the first point as policy invariably claims that you absolutely cannot work more than 5.5 hours without a lunch break – “It’s the law!!!” And yet a company that uses 6 hours as the criterion is equally adamant that they’re following the law.

That is probably a difference in how the company interprets (or thinks the state will interpret) 6 hours- is it that a break is required for a six hour shift ( leading to 5.5 hours of work plus a 30 minute break ) or for someone who works six hours ( which would then make the shift 6.5 hours start to finish)? And the “you must take exactly 30 minutes” vs a minute or five either way is a matter of risk tolerance- if the law says at least 30 minutes, it’s extremely unlikely that they will get into trouble if people’s breaks range from 25-35 minutes but it theoretically could happen.

Sometimes the law is different for different jobs - break requirements may be different for a factory worker vs an office worker vs the lone employee on duty overnight at a gas station.

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**Author:** ![The\_Joker\_and\_the\_Thief](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e79b87/32.png) [@The\_Joker\_and\_the\_Thief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Joker_and_the_Thief)\
**Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-wish-companies-would-actually-learn-labor-laws/719053/22 "2015-05-02T16:57:46Z")

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> [@Flyer](#):
>
> Utterly incorrect. The law is very clear and simple on the issue–no lawyers are needed. The trouble is that so few companies bother to actually read the law.

I guess that’s why you have a twenty-post thread discussing labor laws.

Which do you think is more plausible: that dozens of companies are simultaneously making empirically wrong business decisions that cost them thousands of dollars per year in productivity, or that the law appears simple to non-lawyers but is more complex than it seems? “The law” consists of not just whatever is published in the state law books, but also the regulations implementing those laws and the court cases fighting over those regulations.

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