Labor Laws: Protecting Employees’ Rights in the Workplace
Labor law concerns the rights and restrictions of employees and their organizations, and intercede professional relationships between workers and their employers. While employees often rally for improved conditions and extended freedoms, employers often try to impose more restrictions for their workers. Complicating matters is the often aggressive presence of workers’ unions, which can wield great political power if strengthened. Thus labor laws often reflect struggles between opposing classes in society.
The Employment Contract
The crux of these labor laws is the employment contract, a written agreement between worker and employer detailing the privileges and responsibilities of each. This contract exists to protect the rights of the worker while demonstrating their commitment to their employer. Most of these contracts fall under an “at-will,” condition, meaning the employer can fire the employee at any time if the terms of the contract are broken. Other components of labor law exist as basic rights for the worker. For instance, minimum wage guarantees that a worker will be paid at least a minimum amount imposed by government standards to be fair.
Length of the Workweek
Additionally, the length of a workday and workweek is another standard of labor laws. The standard workday length is imposed to ensure that an employee cannot be forced into overexertion. In the United States, labor law decrees the standard work week to be 40 hours, meaning that no employer can force their staff to work more than that. However, a worker is permitted to work up to 72 hours a week if they desire. After working up to 72 hours in a week, harvesters are required to receive 24 hours off before they are permitted to work again. Other elements of labor law include those guidelines pertaining to health and safety conditions of the workplace, anti-discrimination laws (preventing employers from discriminating against different races, genders, classes or ages), and unfair dismissal (ensuring that an employee is fired for just cause). Specifically, the fifth and fourteenth amendments of the Constitution speak out against discrimination.
Obligations of the Employee
In addition to outlining the obligations and needs of the workers from employers and the workplace environment, labor laws also extend to the acts employees can take to represent themselves. Trade unions, strikes and pickets are all organizations or methods used by workers to change or enforce workplace rights. Strikes are considered to be the most powerful of weapons allowed to the workers. However, strikes must obey general laws and regulations to be regarded legitimate by the government.
For example, strikes must be decided on by trade union officials. Sympathy strikes, or those held against companies by which the strikers are not immediately employed, as well as those general strikes prohibited by a public order, may be prohibited. Likewise, the profession of an individual may disqualify them from participating in a strike (including government workers such as firemen, police officers, teachers, etc.) Boycotts, or refusing to support businesses until they meet a demand, are considered to be a type of strike. Other methods of striking include the go-slow, in which workers purposefully decrease their productivity, or sabotage, in which workers intentionally perform poorly. Likewise, workers may refuse to attend work to make a statement. While some labor law prohibits strikes, there is no law that endorses it.
For legal advice regarding labor laws, visit Shavitz Law. Serving clients in the Boca Raton, Florida area.
