Argument analysis: What is work, anyway? : SCOTUSblog

This is an odd case that came up in my SCOTUS feed and I ponder as to how or why it made it all the way to the SCOTUS. What appears to be the question at hand is this. You work at a factory. As part of the factories inventory control or loss prevention, after clocking out for the day one is required to go through a screening process to make sure you haven’t stolen anything from the shelves or the bins. Should the time spent going through this screening process be compensated for?

As the argument unfolded, the Court was being pulled by three lawyers between two opposite legal positions.  The first is that this particular kind of security screening is simply part of the process of going out the door at the end of the shift, like clocking out, and so no extra pay should be due.  Second, that kind of added assignment is required by the employer and for the company’s benefit, so it is part of the job and should earn more pay.
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Thierman’s argument seemed to grow stronger the longer it went, and he made what might be a telling point in noting that, in this case, the workers actually had punched out for the day before the screening began. That meant a break in their work pattern, and they had to stay on in order to empty their pockets and go through a metal detector. “Checkout is completely finished” when that happens, he said. If “one straw is added on top of checkout,” he said colorfully, that’s deserving of added pay.

Argument analysis: What is work, anyway? : SCOTUSblog