Re: 80 hour weeks
Makes me glad I work in Europe - contracts must state weekly hours / daily hours (and core period of availability, if it is flex time), contracts can only state "reasonable" overtime, which means not every day or every week from here to eternity, and a maximum of a 48 hour average over 6 weeks (rolling window). That is for salaried staff, as well as hourly paid.
Excessive overtime can be agreed upon, but it has to be a limited time frame (a few weeks at most) and it has to be paid (first 8 hours per week can be seen as the "reasonable" part and not recompensed, but everything over that is "excessive" and will need to be paid or the employee gets time off in lieu. This has to be agreed upon by management, the employees and an employee relations ombudsman. (My daughter went through this a few years back, when her employer were having a tough time and the employees agreed to work extra shifts to ensure the survival of the company, but it was a short term agreement and was reviewed every month.)
Biting the hand that feeds IT
