Legal Question in Employment Law in California

Yes they can. There may be other reasons an employer needs to know how many hours its employees are spending on particular tasks, even exempt employees. The cost of labor is usually factored into the price of goods and services. The employer may also want to know how productive your time is, which relates to job performance.

Absolutely. As long as there is no connection between hours worked and pay, it is completely legal. There are many totally legitimate reasons to track exempt employees' work time. For example, I was always expected to keep a time-sheet when I was an in-house attorney and when a deputy city attorney, just like when in private practice, because my time was charged to the budget of the subsidiary profit center of the company I worked for, and was charged to the department or agency I was working for when on the city payroll. There are many similar reasons to track other employees' time, both for management purposes and accounting purposes.

Of course, to document what is being done and evaluate job performance, etc. As long as you are paid your salary, the employer determines what and how you do it at work.