AMC Movie Theatre Workers Don't Receive Holiday Pay
Workers at the largest cinema chain in the US don't receive any extra compensation for working Christmas or Christmas Eve
This week is one of the busiest for movie theatres across the United States, with around 5 percent of annual box office sales occurring in the week of December 24 to December 31.
The largest movie theatre chain in the United States, AMC Theatres, do not pay their employees extra at all for working Christmas or Christmas Eve, and due to an outdated federal labor law loophole from the 1930’s, exempting theatre employees from overtime laws.
“AMC claims because we are in the ‘entertainment’ sector, by law we aren’t required holiday pay or overtime pay if we work more than 40 hrs,” said a current AMC employee in Detroit, Michigan who requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “It is at the manager’s discretion to give employees an extra $1 raise an hour on holiday but you have to have a manager that has enough heart to fight for things like that. The management at our particular store claims they can’t get corporate to sign off on that decision but I feel as though its not a priority to them. I know this year nobody is getting holiday pay for Thanksgiving or Christmas.”
A petition on coworker.org has received thousands of signatures calling on AMC to pay employees holiday pay for sacrificing time away from their families on the holidays to work, even as management at AMC Theatres do receive time and a half holiday pay.
https://www.coworker.org/petitions/amending-motion-picture-theater-overtime-exempt-rule-from-flsa