Overtime Regulations Hurt Workers
June 2020: I read this essay and added commentary for Episode 318 of the Everything Voluntary podcast. Since the beginning of the year, I've held a second job working as a part-time cashier for Lowe's. This is my first job in this type of retail environment. My mother has worked at Target for over decade, and what I'm about to say as held true for her as well. Most states, if not all, have some sort of law requiring employers to pay their employees 1.5 times their pay for overtime. Most states stipulate that overtime is any thing over 40 hours a week. Other states look at it daily, and require anything over 8 hours be paid as overtime. Here's why these laws hurt works, and are inconsistent. Both Lowe's and Target do a very good job at keeping their employees from working anywhere too close to 40 hours. And one of the ways they do this is by hiring more employees, and diluting everyone's hours. I hear it all the time from upper management, "Are you near 4...