Picture this working scenario. You are lucky enough to have a job where you are required to pay your employer just to work. A fee that you pay just for showing up. You pay for everything from the uniform you are required to wear, to the locker you use to safeguard your valuables, to tipping everyone else before you ever collect a dime in wages. Now, also imagine that if you are late to work, late for your shift, or have to leave early (even if for an emergency), you pay a fine to your employer. You are not permitted to use your cellphone, bring food or drinks to work, and you can only take a break when your boss says so, albeit for limited time. And let us not forget, you are also required to maintain a certain body shape lest you will be “shamed if deemed overweight.”
These working conditions sound an awful lot like a sweatshop or forced labor. One might even think that for these types of draconian measures, the pay must be pretty substantial. To the contrary, according to the allegations contained in a complaint filed in the District of New Jersey, the pay rate for this job was not even $8.38 per hour, the state’s rate for minimum wage. According to the complaint, to work as an exotic dancer at “Breathless Men’s Club” (the club) in Rahway, New Jersey, you must meet all of the foregoing requirements, in addition to a myriad of other rules and regulations, before you can ever take the stage. Oftentimes dancers at the club work an entire shift and actually lose money.
