[citation][nom]dgingeri[/nom]Unfortunately, here in the US, "skilled technical" workers can be employed as salary workers, and can have overtime forced on them. Most of the time, though, they don't abuse that. Some do. Turnover is usually pretty high at companies like that.As contractors, though, they can be employed on a "deliverables" system. I was doing repairs for Dell for about a week as a contractor. The company employing me would give me $15 for each service call they sent me. The first day, they sent me on 4 LCD replacements for laptops. Each repair took over an hour because they didn't include the screen bezel with the LCD. (Taking the freaking bezels off those things is both long and painful. I ended that day with 9 cuts on my fingers in various places from the plastic. I had to clean my blood off every one of those laptops before giving them back, taking more time.) With travel and prep time, I made about $5.20 per hour. I ended with week making about $6 per hour, but I had also used two tanks of gas at my expense, so my final take home pay was closer to $2 per hour. I made a total of $78 for that week after expenses. This was in 2004. Like I said, I quit after a week. If you don't let them take advantage of you, they can't get away with it. Just walk away. that's the best way to get it to stop.[/citation]
That's actually a fairly common misconception, for the most part only management is truly exempt from overtime pay.