"Chinese overtime" (and "textiled hikers")

[Laurence Horn]

I hadn't previously encountered this entry in the catalog that
currently includes Chinese fire drills and Chinese landings and
Chinese home runs, as discussed in previous threads.  An article in
this week's New Haven Advocate, our weekly alternative paper, details
a suit filed by Save-a-Lot grocery by assistant manager Ed Roach on
the grounds that "under the store policy, Roach made less money [per
hour] the more hours he put in", i.e. a lower hourly rate for each
additional hour he worked.  Some web sites on the practice of Chinese
overtime:
http://www.overtime-flsa.com/what-is-chinese-overtime
("an employee is paid a fixed salary each workweek for hours that
vary up and down from week to week, the employer may use an overtime
calculation method called 'fixed salary for fluctuating workweeks'")
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060707171900AAFIqtf
http://www.twc.state.tx.us/news/efte/h_regular_rate_salaried_nx.html

LH

P.S.  An article "Swaying in the Breeze" in the same issue of the N.
H. Advocate written by Dick Morrill, a practitioner of nude hiking
(increasingly trendy in the Cascades, it would appear) refers to
clothed individuals he encounters along the trail as "textiled
hikers", which strikes me as a nice, if not particularly useful,
retronym.  (I know, the first hikers--especially if you count our
non-human ancestors, Neanderthals, and such--were probably as nude as
Mr. Morrill, but still...)  Least-likely-to-succeed WOTY candidate,
you think?

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