Employees Protest Against Mandatory Overtime Striking workers respond to a fiery speech rally outside Verizon Communications headquarters in Boston on Friday, the sixth day of the strike. Alicia Ernest, who was picketing in Beltsville, Md., says she brought her son because her job had kept her from spending as much time with him as she'd like, mainly because she has to work 15 hours of overtime every week. I have a son, and I am a single parent, and I'm forced to make other arrangements to take care of my son and have him go to school because I have to be here at Bell Atlantic on a weekly basis, forced to work overtime with no exceptions and no questions asked. You don't have that luxury of going to that sporting event or to that school event because of overtime.
Disciplinary action can mean termination.
And while many workers say they'd be more willing to log overtime if it was optional, mandatory overtime is unacceptable. Voluntary More and more workers are saying that enough is enough. Boeing last March, Kaiser Aluminum this summer, and Bridgestone-Firestone, US West and Bell Atlantic in 1998. Among the hardest hit are nurses, who have walked off the job at three major hospitals in the last year, and are threatening more job actions. Employers say they'd like to make overtime voluntary, but the booming economy is making it tougher than ever.