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Hey man some of us take pride in giving our whole life to some pointless corporation. Not going home, that's real passion.

Years ago in another web community, someone said, "I'm amazed at how willing the American workforce is to bend over and get fucked in the ass."

 

Anyone know the song by John Lennon, Working Class Hero? It's a good one. Check it out.

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I'm going to be on vacation in New Orleans from Friday to Tuesday and I'm calling into work for the team huddle on Monday morning. Voluntarily.

 

Americans are fucked up.

 

Also if anyone is in New Orleans, say hello I guess???

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Jeebus, what the fuck?  How is that even legal?

 

I've asked that question myself and never quite gotten a straight answer, either because they don't know it or understand it.  Probably a bit of both.  The reason I'm most often told is because some legal loophole allowed the company to say the standard work week was 40-45 hours, but since the federal length is 40 those extra hours somehow get turned into free labor.  I should also mention that I'm salaried, which is usually exempt from overtime rules at all.  In a way I'm lucky to even get paid, which is maybe worse depending on how you look at it.

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That seems really messed up. I'm betting if someone had the resources to lawyer up, they could win it. I really hope there aren't too many companies interpreting overtime pay this way.

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I've probably somewhat overstepped my bounds and have gone into more detail than I should have, but suffice it to say that this is in fact legal despite however shitty it seems.

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Yeah, in a situation like this, what would likely happen is if you threatened legal action, they would just say "well as a salaried employee, you're overtime exempt anyway, and we don't have to pay you anything extra anyway, so we just won't going forward."

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Years ago in another web community, someone said, "I'm amazed at how willing the American workforce is to bend over and get fucked in the ass."

 

Anyone know the song by John Lennon, Working Class Hero? It's a good one. Check it out.

 

From what I understand, Japan has it even worse. I can't image it.

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Yeah, in a situation like this, what would likely happen is if you threatened legal action, they would just say "well as a salaried employee, you're overtime exempt anyway, and we don't have to pay you anything extra anyway, so we just won't going forward."

 

Common misconception that isn't really true.  Companies are notorious for misclassifying employees as exempt, when the employee does not meet the federal requirements to be overtime exempt.  Both hourly workers and salary workers can be exempt from overtime pay, what matters are the duties they perform.  Salary just became a convenient shorthand because it's the more common scenario (but I come from having worked in both news and farming, two of the industries with hourly exemptions).  As a general rule of thumb, exempt salaried employees need to be managers, who oversee other employees with the ability to hire/fire.  Or they need to be a professional (doctor, lawyer, etc).  There's a few other minutia that SAM could fall under, not knowing all the requirements of the job, but contrary to what a lot of businesses believe, you can't just willy nilly classify anyone you want as salaried.  The penalty can really rack up for a company if they are found to have misclassified, to the tune of having to pay employees double overtime (3x pay) for every hour they failed to properly compensate someone. 

 

That's all I remember off the top of my head when I was reading up on this stuff last year, I'm sure it's not a perfect summary, but it's pretty close. 

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I am fortunate enough to be in a position where I have a good, stable, permanent full-time job.  However, I've been curious about what else is out there, so I applied to a similar job at a local hospital.  Went through the interview process, hiring manager brings up salary, and it's a substantial and significant drop from what I currently make.  

 

If you're posting a job and you are in the public sector, please also post the salary so that people know whether or not it's worth their time.  It will also give people who are familiar with the industry a sense for how much you know about the industry and how you're likely to treat your employees.

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Derp, Computer Employee was the one I forgot, I knew there was something.  Still, the requirements are pretty clear and it's another area that employers are likely to try and misclassify people (she works with computers, so she must be exempt!)

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Sweeden. 

 

Sweeeeeeeeeeden!

 

5 Weeks off is the norm here (The longer you've been with the company you can usually bargain for more) and companies are required to offer employees to take 4 consecutive weeks of vacation once a year.

I have to point out that the 4 day work week (or 6 hour workday) are merely experiments that are being done in very small scale at either individual companies or individual branches of municipal services (such as hospitals and elderly care). It's far, far, far away from becoming even remotely a common occurence, although the initial results sound promising (with healthier, happier and more efficient staff as well as (in the case of hospitals) more satisfied patients.

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Currently I don't get overtime pay, but I get 30% loading to make up for it.

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I'm nearing the end of what is hopefully going to be my last night shift for a year.  It's about time too, some of the guys are here are starting to get a little stir crazy.  I'm about ready to join them.

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Common misconception that isn't really true.  Companies are notorious for misclassifying employees as exempt, when the employee does not meet the federal requirements to be overtime exempt.  Both hourly workers and salary workers can be exempt from overtime pay, what matters are the duties they perform.  Salary just became a convenient shorthand because it's the more common scenario (but I come from having worked in both news and farming, two of the industries with hourly exemptions).  As a general rule of thumb, exempt salaried employees need to be managers, who oversee other employees with the ability to hire/fire.  Or they need to be a professional (doctor, lawyer, etc).  There's a few other minutia that SAM could fall under, not knowing all the requirements of the job, but contrary to what a lot of businesses believe, you can't just willy nilly classify anyone you want as salaried.  The penalty can really rack up for a company if they are found to have misclassified, to the tune of having to pay employees double overtime (3x pay) for every hour they failed to properly compensate someone.

Considering that, it makes me more upset game developers aren't paid by the hour. I feel like so much could be solved that way in terms of work stress but it would be a big shake up to get used to as so many companies are used to burning people out with little penalty.

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Life's been busy.

 

I'm now the assistant editor for my friend's magazine and will be for the online version of it too. 

 

My writing has halted. It ebbs and flows and I've learned to work with it and not worry about me not writing.

 

On Paxil now and it has further leveled me out, but it decreases my sex drive and numbs my dick. It sucks ass, but oh well.

 

Work as been great and I'm gaining a good rep as a tour guide. I'm a good narrator and educator. Maybe I should be a teacher or prof....

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Sweeeeeeeeeeden!

 

5 Weeks off is the norm here (The longer you've been with the company you can usually bargain for more) and companies are required to offer employees to take 4 consecutive weeks of vacation once a year.

I have to point out that the 4 day work week (or 6 hour workday) are merely experiments that are being done in very small scale at either individual companies or individual branches of municipal services (such as hospitals and elderly care). It's far, far, far away from becoming even remotely a common occurence, although the initial results sound promising (with healthier, happier and more efficient staff as well as (in the case of hospitals) more satisfied patients.

I want to live abroad for a while, but this is one of the things I struggle with. I could not imagine only having 7-12 days of vacation per year. I don't live to work. Fuck that.

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In the past 3 years I've taken 3 weeks holiday. I guess it depends on what you do, I love my job and while the holiday has been enjoyable, I always was desperate to get back into the lab.

I've also been working for 27 days straight, but that's because it's crunch time and will be until 8th of Jan when my contract ends. One paper down (almost) one to go!

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I get something like 17 days of vacation a year, plus holidays, and am required to spend it (you can only carry over 10 days from year to year and I've had that extra 10 for a while now.) What makes it miserable isn't the amount of vacation I get, but the complete disaster I come back to since there really isn't anyone else who does my job so work just stacks up. Every time someone lower on my team is sick, my manager busts his ass to try and find people to take things over and cover (including me a lot of the time) but there just anyone else on my team that can really take stuff over for me. I rarely get to take sick time either. I pretty much just go to work unless I'm particularly contagious.

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I've probably asked this question before in this very thread, but: Why are Americans so afraid of unions? A lot of the work "luxuries" we enjoy here in Scandinavia like long holidays, proper parental leave and mandated overtime pay are things the unions here have fought hard to get through. 

 

But every time I hear Americans talking about unions it's in this weird hushed tone, like they're afraid of someone hearing them suggest it. Like Austin Walker talking about working conditions in the games industry on the Beastcast: "Now, I'm not saying they should UNIONIZE, but..." But what? Why not? I literally don't understand.

 

 

 

 

In the specific case of overtime: I also have a salaried contract where overtime doesn't kick in until X amount of hours more than regular has been worked. But! It works both ways. So if I have to leave a couple of hours early because I have a personal errand, no big deal, I still get my regular pay. And crucially, I have a working environment where this is normal and even encouraged. I wont get a stare-down from my boss or a lecture about showing proper investment in the work just because I need to pick up my sister at the train station.

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Because unions are socialist and we don't want to be like those damn commies.

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Nearly a century of institutionalized stigmas about unions being bastions for the greedy and lazy as perpetrated by corporate interests and a history of red scare. It's like the way people say "I'm no feminist, but...", except much much more entrenched and protected. 

 

There is no escaping it. American capitalism will always be a race to the bottom.

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