Legal Definitions - wage-and-hour law

Wage-and-hour law refers to the collection of legal rules and regulations that establish fundamental standards for employee compensation and working conditions.

These laws primarily dictate:

• The minimum hourly wage an employer must pay their employees.
• The conditions under which employees must receive overtime pay (typically a higher rate for hours worked beyond a standard workweek).
• Other related protections, such as requirements for meal and rest breaks, and accurate record-keeping of hours worked.

The purpose of wage-and-hour laws is to protect employees from exploitation and ensure fair treatment in the workplace.

Here are some examples illustrating how wage-and-hour laws apply:

• Imagine a small local bookstore hires a new part-time assistant. The state where the bookstore operates has a minimum wage of $15 per hour. If the bookstore owner decides to pay the assistant only $12 per hour, they would be in violation of a wage-and-hour law. This law sets the lowest legal amount an employee can be paid for their work, ensuring a basic standard of living.

• Consider a manufacturing plant where production demands are high. Employees are often required to work 10-hour shifts, five days a week, totaling 50 hours. If the company only pays these employees their standard hourly rate for all 50 hours, without providing a higher "time-and-a-half" rate for the 10 hours worked beyond the standard 40-hour workweek, they would be violating a wage-and-hour law. Such laws mandate premium pay for overtime work to prevent employers from overworking staff without proper compensation.

• A tech startup encourages its salaried employees to frequently check and respond to emails late into the evening and on weekends, even though their official work hours are 9 AM to 5 PM. If these employees are classified in a way that makes them eligible for overtime (i.e., they are not truly "exempt" from overtime rules), and the company does not track or compensate them for these additional hours, it could be a violation of wage-and-hour laws. These laws ensure that all compensable work time is properly recorded and paid, even if it occurs outside traditional office hours or remotely.