How did the lunch break regulation come to pass?
Barry: It came to pass like this: here is the real, unvarnished story. The Industrial Welfare Commission was having a hearing in Burbank, and it was kind of a quiet day and there weren’t a lot of people there. We were taking testimony generally on rest breaks and meal periods. There weren’t really any proposals around or any controversies. The Chief Counsel of the Labor Commission got up to answer a question about meals and rest breaks based on somebody’s testimony and I asked him what the remedy was for failing to give somebody their break or meal period. He said that really, there IS no remedy; that in fact, the only thing that they can do is they can order the employer to start giving (breaks and lunch periods) but there is no remedy. So, I said, well, I don’t think THAT’s right.
