Valleywag reports this morning that some Google employees will be reclassified as hourly employees as of April 1, and that they'll be ordered (per Federal employment laws) to take a 30-minute lunch break every day and two 15-minute breaks, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, just like Caltrans workers, Wal-Mart employees, and checkers down at the local Safeway. A Google representative I contacted this afternoon refused to confirm anything about the date, number of employees affected, or who would be affected, but did confirm that a reclassification was happening.
It's not uncommon for companies such as Microsoft, Yahoo, or Google to keep their contractors and less-essential employees at arm's length, protecting the companies from having to give out stock options to, say, janitors by making sure those employees are actually employed by a separate service provider. It is a bit more unusual to reclassify employees once they've already been brought into the inner circle, however.
