But not all workers are impressed with such arguments. In a 2005 Alameda County Superior Court case, a jury awarded $172 million to 116,000 current and former employees of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which was accused of failing to pay workers for missed lunch breaks. The company is appealing.
Breaks are an essential part of a job, whether somebody works in a restaurant, store or factory, said Daniel Ponsky, 33, a Sherman Oaks bartender. "A breather is nice when you are on your feet and always running around," he said.
Ponsky, who says he was forced to "work off the clock," is a plaintiff in a break-related lawsuit against a restaurant chain that is now before the California Supreme Court.
As for overtime, California law calls for time-and-one-half pay for hourly workers after they clock eight hours in a single day. Additionally, in California and other states, extra pay accrues on a weekly basis after a worker puts in 40 hours.
Employers say the law makes it more expensive and difficult for managers to let an employee juggle his or her schedule to take care of personal or family needs, business lobbyists say.
Workers, they argue, should be free to take off an hour to watch a child's Little League game and make it up by staying late the next day, without forcing their employer to pay overtime.
Labor unions counter that California's existing overtime laws already provide plenty of flexibility for both bosses and their employees, without hurting workers' safety or wages.
They point to a 1999 state law that exempts employers from paying overtime to individual workers who ask to alter their schedules to take care of personal needs. The law also allows all the employees of a specific business unit or office to switch to a 10-hour-a-day, four-day workweek -- without earning daily overtime -- but only after holding an election. Business lobbyists call it all very cumbersome.
Employers' latest efforts to tie both the meal break and overtime issue to contentious budget negotiations are aimed at reversing basic worker rights, said Art Pulaski, executive secretary-treasurer of the California Labor Federation.
"It's about trying to help Wal-Mart and other big corporations get away from the long-established understanding that people should get a meal break at work" or be paid extra for extra hours, Pulasksi said.
