Oxford Comma Worth $5 Million

New York Times reports: [edited]

Ending a case that electrified punctuation pedants, Oakhurst Dairy settled a $5 million overtime dispute with its drivers that hinged on the lack of an Oxford comma in state law.

The case began in 2014, when three truck drivers sued the dairy for what they said was four years’ worth of overtime pay they had been denied. Maine law requires time-and-a-half pay for each hour worked after 40 hours, but it carved out exemptions for:

‘The canning, processing, preserving, freezing, drying, marketing, storing, packing for shipment or distribution of:

(1) Agricultural produce;
(2) Meat and fish products; and
(3) Perishable foods.’

What followed the last comma in the first sentence was the crux of the matter: ‘packing for shipment or distribution of’. The court ruled that it was not clear whether the law exempted the distribution of the three categories that followed, or if it exempted packing for the shipment or distribution of them.

Had there been a comma after ‘shipment’ the meaning would have been clear.
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