Is it Illegal not to have Labor day off, or not receive additional pay?

It is legal to have to work. It is legal to get standard pay. Your days off are not dictated by law, only by your employer.

@DrBill is exactly right. Unions are a wonderful thing.

I see that’s kind of what I thought but a friend of mine said I should look into it. What about if you work over 40 hours, is an employer required to pay you overtime?

FLSA does have laws regarding overtime, but nothing regarding holidays for non-federal workers.

What is this, the former Soviet Union? Sweden? It’s the West baby.
Actually a state doesn’t even have to recognize National Holidays. The bassackwards government down in Arizona failed for years to recognize Martin Luther King day for years.

When I worked at Starbucks, they typically had shorter days on Christmas and new years, and gave you pay-and-a-half for the hours you worked on those days.

Other than that though, no, holidays were just work days.

I get holiday pay for working on holidays, so obviously, it isn’t illegal. And I can always use 8 hours of overtime pay.

You should have received a list of days off when you accepted your position with your job therefore you would have been aware that Labor Day was not a holiday with this company.

Employers can honor as many holidays or as few as they choose most private company’s (not government, pulic service, or non-for profit) take the same holidays as the others because it enhances their benefit package. But to answer your question dircetly it is not illegal.

It’s legal for you not to go to work, as well.

Of course it’s not. A federal holiday simply means that it is observed by federal employees (Post Office, white house employees, etc). Every company is free to have their own holiday calendar, which may or may not have anything to do with the Federal Holidays.

I’ve noticed that the higher paying a job is, the more likely they are to take (give?) national holidays off.

Unfortunately, entry-level jobs are the sorts where it’s best for them to stay open on said Holidays.

I’ve worked on Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve, so, yeah, it’s not illegal; it’s just not fun. :)

Does anyone else think Halloween should be a national holiday? ‘Cuz that would be awesome.

It’s entirely up to the employer. The reason why most employers give paid holidays or OT for working holidays is that it is a cheap perk and good PR. If you are working in an office environment, why would you stay open when your client base is not working so there is little to do. I remember when much of Silicon Valley closed down from 12/24–½ because so little work got done. Employees were paid for Christmas and New Years but if they wanted to get paid for the intervening week they had to take vacation days.

Retail stores often stay open because we will shop any day but because the bigger chains have unions some of the non union places follow suit to keep the unions out,
i remember working in a K-Mart kind of store in the 1970’s when stores still stayed closed on Thanksgiving and we opened.

Small service companies close because few people want drapes installed or Merry Maids to come on Easter or the 4th of July.

@johnny0313x

Although there are laws about paying overtime, it is also important to remember that “small employers” with less than 15 employees are not subject to these laws, they are also not required to pay minimum wage.

As long as you’re not a federal employee, its absolutely legal to have you work any day.

@avvooooooo it’s absolutely legal to have you WORK a holiday even if you’re a Federal employee. As I said earlier, Federal jobs observe the holiday. That doesn’t mean they get it off. That may mean, for example, that they get holiday pay. For example, there are US Postal Employees working at the bulk mail processing centers (ie, not your local post office) 365 days a year.

(er. That is, there are always employees there. Not that any particular employee works every single day of the year.)

@SeventhSense What do you mean Arizona didn’t recognize Martin Luther King day? Do you mean if you worked for the state government you didn’t get the day off?

MLK is not a federal holiday. It is a State holiday, and not all states embraced it right away.
I think they still celebrate Robert E. Lee’s birthday in the south, and not Lincoln’s.

Along with what @filmfann holidays are many times based on the population in the local area. Not even state, but by city and county. Like in Boca Raton, FL I’m guessing schools close on yum kippur, but not here outside of Memphis. Schools generally honor holidays because if a certain percentage of the student body does not show up for school it is not counted as a school day, so they plan for that.

@JLeslie Cool! Maybe San Francisco can give holiday status to Mavericks(location)

@JLeslie
The state didn’t even acknowledge it as a legitimate holiday. I don’t know what the case was for Federal workers in the state.

@SeventhSense Not federal workers, I meant state workers, state gov’t, since you had said the state doesn’t acknowledge it. I still am not sure what you mean? They just don’t celebrate the holiday? Or, people actually came out and said they don’t understand why it should be a holiday? Are you saying the people who live in Arizona are prejudiced? Or maybe they didn’t give days off in school and other business? Is that what you mean? Don’t get me wrong, I think Martin Luther King day should be celebrated everywhere, I don’t look at him only as a civil rights leader for blacks, but a great man who played a significant role in American history who we all can learn from, for all people.

@JLeslie
Well it was a definite prejudice/bias thing. And yes from what I understand, when children in public school in other states had off they did not. Federal workers within a state such as USPS are Federal workers and I don’t know what the case was with them. I think the legislature adapted the holiday from national pressure.
nice eyes by the way

thank you

Were there very few black people where you lived in Arizona? They probably chose to take other holidays that fit the population maybe? Doesn’t mean they are prejudiced, might be ignorant to the greatness of Martin Luther King, that he really spoke to all of us.

From Wikipedia (not the end all source but I imagine this is all verifiable)
Reluctance to observe day

Senator Jesse Helms (R-North Carolina) led opposition to the bill and questioned whether King was important enough to receive such an honor. He also criticized King’s opposition to the Vietnam War and accused him of espousing “action-oriented Marxism”.[9]

Ronald Reagan was also opposed to the holiday, citing cost concerns.[10] He threatened to veto the King Day bill but recanted after Congress passed it with an overwhelming veto-proof majority (338 to 90 in the House of Representatives and 78 to 22 in the Senate).[11]

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) voted against the creation of the holiday to honor King, and later defended Arizona Republican Governor Evan Mecham’s rescinding of the state holiday in honor of King created by his Democratic predecessor. After his opposition grew increasingly untenable, McCain reversed his position, and encouraged his home state of Arizona to recognize the holiday despite opposition from Mecham.[12]

In 1990, The Arizonans were given the opportunity to vote to observe an MLK holiday. McCain successfully appealed to former President Ronald Reagan to support the holiday.[13] Prior to that date, New Hampshire and Arizona had not observed the day. Throughout the 1990s, this was heavily criticized. Following the failure of the 1990 proposition to recognize the holiday in Arizona, the National Football League moved Super Bowl XXVII from Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California.[14] The hip-hop group Public Enemy recorded a song titled “By The Time I Get To Arizona”, on their 1991 album Apocalypse 91… The Enemy Strikes Black, in which they describe assassinating Arizona Governor Fife Symington III for his opposition to the holiday.

On May 2, 2000, South Carolina governor Jim Hodges signed a bill to make Martin Luther King, Jr.‘s birthday an official state holiday. South Carolina was the last state to recognize the day as a paid holiday for all state employees. Prior to this, employees could choose between celebrating Martin Luther King Day or one of three Confederate holidays.[15]

That last notation was perhaps the most blatantly racist.

@filmfann Our schools are closed for Lunar New Year. Does that count?

@SeventhSense Interesting. Thank you. The sentence “The Enemy Strikes Black, in which they describe assassinating Arizona Governor Fife Symington III for his opposition to the holiday” shows whoever wrote that knows nothing about what King stood for—disappointing.

LOL-Public Enemy was never one for PC songs. Yes, I agree it kind of misses the sentiment of his message.
It must be maddening to be in a society though when your rights and heroes are assassinated and then their corpse is raised up and shot again.

It’s perfectly legal for your company’s management/ownership to be dominant Type-A a&&holes who need to work and want you to work on holidays.

(the Service and Hospitality industries are the exception, those businesses, by logic, must be open on holidays, so those managers are not the a&&holes that govern other businesses open on holidays, plus those industries usually pay time-and-a-half or doubletime).