This shows how states can and do pass employment laws tougher than the federal government's. After Supreme Court ruled unanimously that federal law doesn't require Amazon pay for time waiting in security lines, lawsuits like this continued at state level bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Companies can be liable for not paying workers for time spent waiting for security checks under California law, unlike federal law, because California's definition of working time is broader than the feds' -it's about being "subject to the control" of boss bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
This is a distinction that's philosophically poignant as well as legally significant: Should working time be measured by whether you're doing work “integral & indispensable” to what you were hired for, or by whether you are "subject to the control" of boss bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
While states have wide discretion to pass tougher rules on "employment law" issues (like minimum wage), they're much more constrained when it comes to private sector "labor law" issues (like unionization rights), where federal law generally preempts states bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
