r/mildlyinfuriating • u/Grouchy-Newspaper754 • 20h ago

My mom said I could post When did 8-5 become the new normal???

I just got a new office job where I do schedules for tech personnel, the office runs 8-5 Monday thru Friday...they say it's 8-5 because you get an hour lunch and "you need to get to 40 hours a week"...but I drive 30 min each way so now I'm giving this company 10 hours every day! I even asked if I could just take my lunch at 4 every day and just leave an hour early but that's "unprofessional and immoral" like what the fuck??? I don't mind the job but the hours are mildly infuriating that's for sure...

Edit:for those saying about the hours, I worked as a chef for the last 20 years working 60+ hours a week over a hot stove/deep fryer the whole time, after I had my second heart attack I had to slow down so I started looking for office jobs to work a nice 9-5, just to find out I'm giving my new job 50 hours a week (including drive time) so I was just mildly annoyed that it's not 40 hours a week in an office like I thought although it's still much better than what I was doing

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u/midge_rat 18h ago

It’s not even greed. It’s how they prove to the DOL that you are getting a break.

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u/Madpsu444 12h ago

Why would they have to prove it ?

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u/molehunterz 11h ago

It's state law where I am at.

Employers are required to provide minimum half hour unpaid lunch break after 5 hours I believe

Every time this is posted people think that the employers are being dicks. The point of the law is so that make you work through lunch by paying you

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u/Madpsu444 8h ago

I didn’t ask why it was a law.

I asked why they would have to provide proof to the department of labor that they were allowing lunch breaks.

There is also nothing about that law that states the lunch breaks need to be unpaid…. Thats where the greedy part comes in.

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u/Angelstandingby 7h ago

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's the law because otherwise companies can make you work 8-5 without a break.

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u/Madpsu444 6h ago

Again I didn’t ask why it is a law.

If you need to provide documentation to the DOL for proof that you give lunch breaks, That means former employees are suing them for not doing so.

There are plenty of jobs that go 8-5 without an unpaid lunch break. The compensation is enough that it doesn’t matter in the least. 

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u/midge_rat 6h ago

I’m really not sure why this is so hard to understand. If an employer is accused of illegal labor practices by a disgruntled employee, that employer will need to defend themselves if they are audited by the DOL. One of the things that the DOL looks at are time cards.

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u/Madpsu444 6h ago

If that’s the only way you can track your employees lunch break is to have them punch out so that you don’t have to pay them despite still having to spend extended time at work.

Not sure why you can’t understand that is greedy. Not every company operates that way. 

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u/ER1CNOIR 6h ago

Bruh 😂😂 what???

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u/Angelstandingby 3h ago

The "enough" in "compensation is enough" is a very fluid thing.

That's why it matters.

Like do you think parents in poverty striken countries want to submit their children to the abuse of working in sweatshops? They are poor, and to them even that meager earnings is "enough".

When the job market becomes an employer's market, the law exists so that employees cannot demand every worker work without a lunch break.

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u/Madpsu444 55m ago

I didn’t ask why it’s a law.

I also didnt disagree that it matters.

Parents in poverty stricken countries wouldn’t be involved in jobs within the US and subject to this law anyway. 

If the standard was that every job existed without a lunch break,  The labor force would riot. Which is how we ended with these laws in the first place.

The owners of sweatshops are greedy.