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as a collective, employees out-vote employers and can obtain this kind of concession through the law but not in an individual contract negotiation
(mancur olson notwithstanding)
taken to its logical extreme your argument would forbid all group negotiations, I'd think?
> taken to its logical extreme your argument would forbid all group negotiations, I'd think?
I don't see how the bill or anything I wrote have anything to do with group negotiations. People can negotiate as a group for all I care, as long as I can negotiate on my own.
[0] https://legislature.mi.gov/documents/2025-2026/billanalysis/...
....what contract? There's no contract in most cases and contracts that exist very rarely define hours. I've never encountered one that did.
> seem to require any particular working hours
This isn't about enforcing hours, it's about communication during hours you're not being paid for.
If the expectations on employees aren't clear then that is an actual problem that a legislator can try to solve. Legislating what should be a line in a contract as an act is silly.
their jury duty hour cap statute uses similar language:
> hours normally and customarily worked by the person during a day
https://www.legislature.mi.gov/Laws/MCL?objectName=mcl-600-1...
Maybe it's established in case law that this is 40 for a salaried worker? (I'm not a michigan employment lawyer). I wonder if a draft of this proposed hardcoding it at 40 and they had a reason not to?
are you saying that unfair terms are a workers own fault for signing? individual workers cant really negotiate employment contract below executive level and staying unemployed is not an option in todays economy. you need unions or laws to make sure everything is fair.
Some examples:
* Management pressuring someone to forge tax documents, and firing said employee when they refused. They even provided a written statement stating this as the reason.
* Someone getting fired for refusing to use grant funding outside of its designated purpose.
* A government employee was accused of corruption and was asked to step down quietly. The city wanted this employee's replacement to take money from one part of the budget for a hush-money payout, while keeping this secret from the city council.
* Someone taking maternity leave, then having her role eliminated. She was given the opportunity to apply for a new job when she returned from mat leave.
* Someone getting laid off while on mat leave. No option for another role.
On paper, all of this was highly illegal, and any employer operating in good faith should have been able to work out a solution when confronted. All of them dug in their heels and refused to consider that they were wrong. Followup generally looked like this:
* Employee escalates within the organization. This becomes a negotiation, where the org decides how much leverage they have. Note that the org might not read the law carefully or even at all. If it's gotten to this point, they've often already decided they can get away with it.
* Depending on the circumstances, reporting to some government agency may happen. There may or may not be an agency that can help. Even if there is, don't expect to become a priority or have significant resources devoted to you.
* More negotiation. The org may have lawyers who are already on salary, or at least an HR department that's ready to step in. You likely do not, and need to track down and pay for your own attorney.
* After a lot negotiation, there's some kind of settlement. If this has to go to a lawsuit, good luck paying for those additional costs and managing everything. Meanwhile, you need to find a new job. For the people you're negotiating against, it's just another day at the office and they have all the time in the world.
Having multiple statutes to establish legal claims can be redundant and annoying. It can also reduce ambiguity when negotiating with an employer who is unwilling or unable to respect their liability. Which ends up being more important will be influenced by the details of the laws and the circumstances of each situation.
This doesn't obviate your point, which I agree is important. It's dumb and sad that this is where we are.
I'm don't think your comment supports your conclusion. Your comment explains that employers are capable of ignoring the law wholesale and engaging in highly illegal acts, but then you conclude that adding more laws will influence them.
The link seems very tenuous, the comment actually seems to be making a good case that having a law saying "don't phone people" will do literally nothing.
I'm trying to say that clearly worded laws provide complainants with more leverage when it's time to negotiate. Ambiguous language or a lack of established cause of action make it easier for someone who doesn't want to listen to drag out the argument.
I've seen the presence of clear laws play out to the advantage of the employee. Eventually corporate counsel sees the liability the company is exposed to and convinces the employer to settle in a more generous fashion than they might otherwise.
It would be great if this need to negotiate could be avoided entirely, but I share your pessimism that written laws alone do not stop bad actors. They can come in handy when things devolve into a legal argument, however.