Is It Fair to Dock Employees$$ Pay for Bathroom Breaks?

For some employees, $$punching a time clock$$ means accounting for all of the time that they are not working. These employees must $$punch in$$ when they arrive and $$punch out$$ when they leave for the day, of course, but they also must clock out when they take personal breaks, including bathroom breaks, coffee breaks, and smoking breaks.

What the Law Says

The Fair Labor Standards Act does not require that an employer offer its employees personal breaks. If an employer does offer them, though, employees must be compensated during those breaks. Otherwise, the employer may effectively be in violation of federal minimum wage laws.

A Pennsylvania Publisher Faces Fines for Unpaid Bathroom Breaks

The issue of unpaid bathroom breaks came to the fore when the U$.$S$.$ Department of Labor $($DOL$)$ filed a lawsuit against American Future Systems, Inc. $($doing business as Progressive Business Publications$).$ The DOL alleged that American Future Systems had created a compensation system in which none of its six thousand employees were compensated for bathroom breaks. The DOL argued that all workday breaks of twenty minutes or less are compensable time. Because American Future Systems did not compensate its employees for such breaks, those employees were not properly credited for all compensable time. The result was that they had $$been paid below the minimum wage established by the Fair Labor Standards Act $($FLSA$).$ A federal district court agreed and ordered the company to pay past and current employees almost $$2$ million to compensate for the lost break time. A federal appellate court affirmed the decision.

The Ethical Issue

Irrespective of the illegality of not paying for personal breaks, there is an ethical issue. Should workers have to face the choice of taking a bathroom break or getting paid? Adam Welsh, a senior trial attorney for the Department of Labor, argued that the answer was no$.$I think it$$s the rare employer who doesn$$t allow its employees to go to the bathroom,$$ Welsh said.

Critical Thinking

Consider a company whose employees include both smokers and nonsmokers. The smokers take numerous paid smoking breaks, while the nonsmokers do not.

Is there an ethical issue here? Discuss.$*$

Which ethical philosophy guided your analysis and how?$*($Pg $49)$