In Taft’s nomenclature, the multiplier was the wage rate and the multiplicand was the number of hours – or vice versa. The problem is that the multiplier was a rate, not a simple number. The test of whether something was a wage law was whether the employer could adjust the rate multiplier to adjust for the new hours multiplicand, to result in the same product – that is, to pay the same total wages for the same total work.

Simple maximum-hour laws such as those upheld in Muller and struck down in Lochner had no wage effect. If a laundress or baker earned $12 for a 12-hour day, each would earn $10 for a 10-hour day. The laws were enforced by criminal fines on the employer.

Oregon’s 10-hour law upheld in Bunting provided for time-and-a-half wages over 10 hours. The Court accepted this not as a wage regulation but as a penalty intended to promote compliance with the hours law. (The fine, in effect, was paid to the employee rather than to the state. This would make enforcement easier.) An employer could reduce the base wage of the baker or laundress to 92 cents per hour and still pay $12 for 12 hours of work (10 hours at .92 and 2 overtime hours at 1.38).