Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/13pdf/12-417_9okb.pdf
Page Number: 5

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SANDIFER v. UNITED STATES STEEL CORP. 

Opinion of the Court 

relevant  here,  they  seek  backpay  for  time  spent  donning
and  doffing  various  pieces  of  protective  gear.  Petitioners 
assert that respondent requires workers to wear all of the
items  because  of  hazards  regularly  encountered  in  steel
plants.
  Petitioners point specifically to 12 of what they state are 
the  most  common  kinds  of  required  protective  gear:  a
flame-retardant jacket, pair of pants, and hood; a hardhat;
a  “snood”;  “wristlets”;  work  gloves;  leggings;  “metatarsal”
boots;  safety  glasses;  earplugs;  and  a  respirator.2    At  bot-
tom,  petitioners  want  to  be  paid  for  the  time  they  have 
spent  putting  on  and  taking  off  those  objects.    In  the  ag-
gregate, the amount of time—and thus money—involved is
likely to be quite large.  Because this donning-and-doffing
time would otherwise be compensable under the Act, U. S.
Steel’s  contention  of  noncompensability  stands  or  falls 
upon the validity of a provision of its collective-bargaining 
agreement  with  petitioners’  union,  which  says  that  this 
time  is  noncompensable.3    The  validity  of  that  provision 
depends,  in  turn,  upon  the  applicability  of  29  U. S. C. 
§203(o)  to  the  time  at  issue.  That  subsection  allows  par-
ties to decide, as part of a collective-bargaining agreement,
that  “time  spent  in  changing  clothes  . . .  at  the  beginning
or end of each workday” is noncompensable.

The District Court granted summary judgment in perti-
nent part to U. S. Steel, holding that donning and doffing 
—————— 

2 The  opinions  below  include  descriptions  of  some  of  the  items.    See 
678  F. 3d  590,  592  (CA7  2012);  2009  WL  3430222,  *2,  *6.    And  the 
opinion of the Court of Appeals provides a photograph of a male model 
wearing  the  jacket,  pants,  hardhat,  snood,  gloves,  boots,  and  glasses.
678 F. 3d, at 593. 

3 The  District  Court  concluded  that  the  collective-bargaining  agree-
ment  provided  that  the  activities  at  issue  here  were  noncompensable,
2009 WL 3430222, *10, and the Seventh Circuit upheld that conclusion, 
678 F. 3d, at 595.  That issue was not among the questions on which we
granted  certiorari,  and  we  take  the  import  of  the  collective-bargaining 
agreement to be a given.