Legal Question in Business Law in California

Re: Potential Salary Hours cut

Of course. The employer also has the right to lay you off or terminate you if he chooses; you are an 'at will' employee. You have the right to quit if you don't like the situation.

Re: Potential Salary Hours cut

Yes.

Re: Potential Salary Hours cut

An employee's pay rate and working hours are, with a few exceptions such as the minimum wage and maximum on-duty rules for workers in certain occupations such as truck driving, train operation or flying, matters of private contract.

If you include "breach of contract" as something that is "illegal," then possibly the change is "illegal" in that sense - but most employment contracts can be terminated at will, and hence their terms as to future events can also be modified at will.

An employer cannot legally attempt to modify a contract's terms after-the-fact; if you worked 40 hours last week at $50 an hour, the employer must pay you $2,000. However, as to next week, there is probably no obligation, other than notifying you. You either go on working (thus accepting the change in terms), or you reject them, which is about the same as quitting.

Occasionally, an employee will have a contract that is not "at will." This would be exemplified by collective-bargaining agreements (union contracts) and executive, professional athlete, and movie-star type contracts that guarantee employment on particular terms for a particular period or project.

By the way, in this current economic environment, you may be lucky that the employer is just cutting hours rather than laying people off.