8 ms·

Honestly over 40 hours should be OT. I feel like a lot of tech workers feel like they have cush jobs which will become less liberal if they start drawing lines

by 49531 8y ago

Honestly over 40 hours should be OT. I feel like a lot of tech workers feel like they have cush jobs which will become less liberal if they start drawing lines in the sand. Our labor is early in its commodification though. As we become less unique we will be easier to exploit. Organizing now isn't a bad idea.

namibj 8y ago
In Germany, there is criminal liability if your subordinates (if you are making their schedules, or would be the one to tell them to go home) work over an average of 8h/workday (only those in the contract count, if none specified, courts said to assume 5 work days), or a top of 10h/shift. Except for a very few select industries, you also need at least iirc 11h off between two shifts, but there are some ways/loopholes around this one. Any overage over the 8h average has to be evened out within usually 3 months, unless something else is in the contract (and as with German law, if the contract is evil, i.e. "sittenwiedrig", it, or at least the relevant portions, is/are void). This does mean that you might not get another job if you speak up, as always, but it does mean that if you are willing to change industries, your superior faces criminal charges. Combined with the neglegible risk of not being able to feed your family, due to the vast social support net, you are actually able to stand by your principles, if you do care.
- jotm 8y ago
  What if the employee actually asks/wants to work overtime?
  - the_mitsuhiko 8y ago
    Is this an actual issue?
    - throwaway37585 8y ago
      What do you mean?
    - jotm 8y ago
      Well, in the UK there's a waiver you can sign that lets you work more than 48 hours a week. It's more beneficial to the employer imo, but people who want a lot of overtime can actually get it. I just wonder if it's stricter in Germany - i.e. you can work 40hrs/week and that's absolutely it.
      - namibj 8y ago
        It'r rather strict. The 10h/day limit can only really be breached if there is something on fire (well, a network counts too), which has a great immediate risk to the company, or if human life is acutely at risk.
      - froh 8y ago
        According to the law the week is Monday through Saturday, 6*8=48... We often tend to forget that we fought hard for the five day week. So while it's common for qualified jobs to have a 40h/WK contract, high workload opens the door to extend the week to 6 days, "Saturday work". Again for qualified jobs you better compensate your people well for that... For the floating average of 8h per day the rules then reference your usual regular work week. So if you are on a 5 day contract (like most people these days), that's where the 40h week comes from. For those amongst us who regularly do 6 days, 48h is perfectly legal in Germany. And temporarily those numbers go up to 50/60h weeks. The floating mean has to go down to 40/48 though. Iirc within a 6 month period, which is not law but usual (court) reading of the law.
        namibj 8y ago
        My information was 3 Months, unless a collective bargaining agreement (Tarifvertrag) says otherwise.
    - Zak 8y ago
      In the US, people actively seeking to work overtime hours for 1.5x their normal pay is fairly common in some industries, such as construction.
  - namibj 8y ago
    The boss can pay them, but he better trusts his subordinate doesn't get pissed off, or else he still lands in front of court. It's a health policy, similar to how public buildings, even those that only invite the public, have to meet certain fire resistance norms. I don't know why those also apply to private shacks in the middle of nowhere, but I assume they do.... Overtime would be coming in Saturday.
  - jdietrich 8y ago
    An EU directive states that no worker can be compelled to work more than 48 hours per week. Workers are allowed to opt out of this limit, but that opt out must be truly voluntary. It is possible that German law may be stricter than EU law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive_2003 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive_2003
    - tialaramex 8y ago
      The UK implementation exempts roles where you actually control your own working hours, e.g. a parish priest is an employee (of the church) but there is nobody setting their working hours, likewise an MP works for their constituents, and is paid by Parliament itself, but neither gets to choose what hours the MP works so they're exempt. Another clever trick is that 48 hours is averaged. Where the nature of the work makes daily leisure time pointless the 48 hours are averaged over an entire year, so maybe an oil worker puts in 10 hours per day for 2 weeks out on the ocean... and then they go home for two entire weeks before their next session. On average that's still under 48 hours per week
walterbell 8y ago
Take a look at California's history of overtime laws for tech writers vs. software developers, http://andreas.com/faq-overtime/ http://andreas.com/faq-overtime/ > April 2000, overtime pay was enacted for all who work in California. A new law (AB60, Assembly Bill 60) established the 40-hour week and mandated overtime pay for work over 40 hours. In reaction, the NACCB (the recruiter association) made a number of legislative manuvers to eliminate overtime pay ... the original law gave everyone overtime pay. The recruiters wanted a new law to exempt Silicon Valley so that computer workers got no overtime pay. We tech writers wanted overtime, so the recruiter’s law couldn’t affect the tech writers. So we added our clause to their law: our exemption from recruiter’s exemption ... Engineers have always refused to organize or even to be aware of their interests: they think recruiters are their friends. One engineer said to me: “Engineers think they’re so smart that no one could do such a thing to them. Wow. They got really screwed.” The law is an annual loss of as much as $50-75,000 dollars per each engineer. Yep, it’s legal. The recuiters wrote a law to take away their money. ... If you’re an engineer, or you make over $41/hr, and you’re not covered by the NWU clause, the recruiters are stripping away your overtime pay. Separately, a modern example of collective bargaining, timed for next week’s WWDC, https://www.wired.com/story/apple-app-developers-union/amp https://www.wired.com/story/apple-app-developers-union/amp > a group identifying themselves as The Developers Union wrote that "it's been difficult for developers to earn a living by writing software" built on Apple's existing values. The group then asked Apple to allow free trials for apps, which would give customers "the chance to experience our work for themselves, before they have to commit to making a purchase." The grassroots effort is being lead by Jake Schumacher, the director of App: The Human Story; software developer Roger Ogden and product designer Loren Morris, who both worked for a timesheet app that was acquired last year; and Brent Simmons...

by 49531 8y ago

namibj 8y ago

In Germany, there is criminal liability if your subordinates (if you are making their schedules, or would be the one to tell them to go home) work over an average of 8h/workday (only those in the contract count, if none specified, courts said to assume 5 work days), or a top of 10h/shift. Except for a very few select industries, you also need at least iirc 11h off between two shifts, but there are some ways/loopholes around this one. Any overage over the 8h average has to be evened out within usually 3 months, unless something else is in the contract (and as with German law, if the contract is evil, i.e. "sittenwiedrig", it, or at least the relevant portions, is/are void). This does mean that you might not get another job if you speak up, as always, but it does mean that if you are willing to change industries, your superior faces criminal charges. Combined with the neglegible risk of not being able to feed your family, due to the vast social support net, you are actually able to stand by your principles, if you do care.

jotm 8y ago
What if the employee actually asks/wants to work overtime?
- the_mitsuhiko 8y ago
  Is this an actual issue?
  - throwaway37585 8y ago
    What do you mean?
  - jotm 8y ago
    Well, in the UK there's a waiver you can sign that lets you work more than 48 hours a week. It's more beneficial to the employer imo, but people who want a lot of overtime can actually get it. I just wonder if it's stricter in Germany - i.e. you can work 40hrs/week and that's absolutely it.
    - namibj 8y ago
      It'r rather strict. The 10h/day limit can only really be breached if there is something on fire (well, a network counts too), which has a great immediate risk to the company, or if human life is acutely at risk.
    - froh 8y ago
      According to the law the week is Monday through Saturday, 6*8=48... We often tend to forget that we fought hard for the five day week. So while it's common for qualified jobs to have a 40h/WK contract, high workload opens the door to extend the week to 6 days, "Saturday work". Again for qualified jobs you better compensate your people well for that... For the floating average of 8h per day the rules then reference your usual regular work week. So if you are on a 5 day contract (like most people these days), that's where the 40h week comes from. For those amongst us who regularly do 6 days, 48h is perfectly legal in Germany. And temporarily those numbers go up to 50/60h weeks. The floating mean has to go down to 40/48 though. Iirc within a 6 month period, which is not law but usual (court) reading of the law.
      - namibj 8y ago
        My information was 3 Months, unless a collective bargaining agreement (Tarifvertrag) says otherwise.
  - Zak 8y ago
    In the US, people actively seeking to work overtime hours for 1.5x their normal pay is fairly common in some industries, such as construction.
- namibj 8y ago
  The boss can pay them, but he better trusts his subordinate doesn't get pissed off, or else he still lands in front of court. It's a health policy, similar to how public buildings, even those that only invite the public, have to meet certain fire resistance norms. I don't know why those also apply to private shacks in the middle of nowhere, but I assume they do.... Overtime would be coming in Saturday.
- jdietrich 8y ago
  An EU directive states that no worker can be compelled to work more than 48 hours per week. Workers are allowed to opt out of this limit, but that opt out must be truly voluntary. It is possible that German law may be stricter than EU law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive_2003 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Time_Directive_2003
  - tialaramex 8y ago
    The UK implementation exempts roles where you actually control your own working hours, e.g. a parish priest is an employee (of the church) but there is nobody setting their working hours, likewise an MP works for their constituents, and is paid by Parliament itself, but neither gets to choose what hours the MP works so they're exempt. Another clever trick is that 48 hours is averaged. Where the nature of the work makes daily leisure time pointless the 48 hours are averaged over an entire year, so maybe an oil worker puts in 10 hours per day for 2 weeks out on the ocean... and then they go home for two entire weeks before their next session. On average that's still under 48 hours per week

walterbell 8y ago

Take a look at California's history of overtime laws for tech writers vs. software developers, http://andreas.com/faq-overtime/ http://andreas.com/faq-overtime/ > April 2000, overtime pay was enacted for all who work in California. A new law (AB60, Assembly Bill 60) established the 40-hour week and mandated overtime pay for work over 40 hours. In reaction, the NACCB (the recruiter association) made a number of legislative manuvers to eliminate overtime pay ... the original law gave everyone overtime pay. The recruiters wanted a new law to exempt Silicon Valley so that computer workers got no overtime pay. We tech writers wanted overtime, so the recruiter’s law couldn’t affect the tech writers. So we added our clause to their law: our exemption from recruiter’s exemption ... Engineers have always refused to organize or even to be aware of their interests: they think recruiters are their friends. One engineer said to me: “Engineers think they’re so smart that no one could do such a thing to them. Wow. They got really screwed.” The law is an annual loss of as much as $50-75,000 dollars per each engineer. Yep, it’s legal. The recuiters wrote a law to take away their money. ... If you’re an engineer, or you make over $41/hr, and you’re not covered by the NWU clause, the recruiters are stripping away your overtime pay. Separately, a modern example of collective bargaining, timed for next week’s WWDC, https://www.wired.com/story/apple-app-developers-union/amp https://www.wired.com/story/apple-app-developers-union/amp > a group identifying themselves as The Developers Union wrote that "it's been difficult for developers to earn a living by writing software" built on Apple's existing values. The group then asked Apple to allow free trials for apps, which would give customers "the chance to experience our work for themselves, before they have to commit to making a purchase." The grassroots effort is being lead by Jake Schumacher, the director of App: The Human Story; software developer Roger Ogden and product designer Loren Morris, who both worked for a timesheet app that was acquired last year; and Brent Simmons...