Something I don’t understand is that typically, salaried positions are not (or at least have not been) considered “hours bound”. Certainly by any employer I’ve ever encountered and traditionally that was even understood by the salaried individual. The exchange for getting a guaranteed salary, benefits, potentially an annual or quarterly bonus and other things (more vacation, the possibility of FMLA, the flexibility to get your work done during the hours that may work best for you on occasion…) we’re all part of the tradeoff for getting a guaranteed, regular paycheck.
For me personally, I’ve always been under the impression that the big difference between hourly and salaried really was the understanding that a salaried employee is supposed to just work to get the work done. That is often more than 40 hours per week (sometimes less!), though not usually that much more, at least on average (I don’t think 50 hours is all that much more, tbh, given all the other benefits though I can see where someone will say “that’s 25% more work!!”)
Today however, I see that employers still have this expectation, but employees are now seeing these positions as just another way of saying “40 hours per week” (and I see this across specialties; so for example I’m a physician and my new colleagues coming on to join us believe that for their salary, they’re only required to work 40 hours and anything beyond that should be paid additional). In my field in particular there’s no real way to predict when a day will actually end, making the idea that your week ends after 40 hours particularly bizarre and very difficult to manage for patient care.
My question is when and how did this happen? I understand that people may only WANT to work 40 hours per week maximum, and that many people believe they are underpaid (and they probably are, tbf), and many more don’t like their job, but when did the mindset change about “salaried still only means I need to do 40-hours per week, period”?