Is it legal for my employer to force some of my coworkers and I to work 70-80 hours per week? We are all salaried employees and our contracts/employment agreements to not mention how long our workweek is supposed to be. I am worried to question my superior for fear of being fired. I am spending far too much time away from family and friends and it is starting to depress me and give me anxiety. To make matters worse, we receive no overtime and no one got end of the year bonuses. The company threatens us about going under and forcing layoffs if everyone doesn’t “play for the same team”. I am as a loyal employee as anyone, but enough is enough! should I get a lawyer?
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There is no discrimination as far as who is forced to work extra hours and who is not forced to work extra hours I am assuming? discrimination makes suing an employer in Arizona and any other state a little easier from what I am told.
However, there are some state laws and federal laws concerning overtime. I found a good website on U.S. dept of labor on overtime. Just go to their website and do a search for overtime. I found that there are exempt and non-exempt employees for overtime. I would find out the laws of Arizon concerning overtime and the Federal laws concerning overtime and see if you are in the non-exempt category. The good news is that whichever law is better for you, is the precedence for overtime. So if Arizona states that any hour over 40 hours is your hourly rate and 1/2, and the federal law is less than that, you get the Arizona rate.
there are also special rules for federal employees and even in Maryland where state contractors must pay a “living wage”.