Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/13pdf/12-417_9okb.pdf
Page Number: 14

Cite as:  571 U. S. ____ (2014) 

11 

Opinion of the Court 

(a  thing)  other  than  it  was;  to  render  different,  alter, 
modify,  transmute”).    We  think  that  despite  the  usual 
meaning  of  “changing  clothes,”  the  broader  statutory 
context  makes  it  plain  that  “time  spent  in  changing 
clothes” includes time spent in altering dress.

The  object  of  §203(o)  is  to  permit  collective  bargaining
over  the  compensability  of  clothes-changing  time  and  to
promote  the  predictability  achieved  through  mutually 
beneficial  negotiation.    There  can  be  little  predictability, 
and  hence  little  meaningful  negotiation,  if  “changing” 
means  only  “substituting.”    Whether  one  actually  ex-
changes  street  clothes  for  work  clothes  or  simply  layers
garments atop one another after arriving on the job site is
often a matter of purely personal choice.  That choice may
be influenced by such happenstances and vagaries as what
month  it  is,  what  styles  are  in  vogue,  what  time  the  em-
ployee  wakes  up,  what  mode  of  transportation  he  uses, 
and so on.  As the Fourth Circuit has put it, if the statute
imposed  a  substitution  requirement  “compensation  for
putting  on  a  company-issued  shirt  might  turn  on  some-
thing  as  trivial  as  whether  the  employee  did  or  did  not 
take off the t-shirt he wore into work that day.”  Sepulveda 
v.  Allen  Family  Foods,  Inc.,  591  F. 3d  209,  216  (2009). 
Where  another  reading  is  textually  permissible,  §203(o)
should not be read to allow workers to opt into or out of its
coverage at random or at will.7 

—————— 

7 This  Court  has  stated  that  “exemptions”  in  the  Fair  Labor  Stand-
ards Act “are to be narrowly construed against the employers seeking to 
assert them.”  Arnold v. Ben Kanowsky, Inc., 361 U. S. 388, 392 (1960). 
We  need  not  disapprove  that  statement  to  resolve  the  present  case.
The exemptions from the Act generally reside in §213, which is entitled 
“Exemptions”  and  classifies  certain  kinds  of  workers  as  uncovered  by
various provisions.  Thus, in Christopher v. SmithKline Beecham Corp., 
567  U. S.  ___,  ___–___,  n.  21  (2012)  (slip  op.,  at  19–20,  n.  21),  we  de-
clared  the  narrow-construction  principle  inapplicable  to  a  provision
appearing in §203, entitled “Definitions.”