If the questions and skepticism of two judges for the 9^th US Circuit Court of Appeals are any indication, McDonalds does not meet the definition of a joint employer under California law. 9^th Circuit Judges Susan Graber and Andrew Kleinfeld indicated their belief that McDonald’s relationship with its franchisees did not give it control over the hiring and firing of workers or their wages in an appeal of a case filed in 2014. The case was brought by Guadalupe Salazar and other employees, who claimed they were denied meal and rest breaks and were not paid for all hours worked because the computer system which miscalculated their hours worked. The workers settled with the franchisee over a year ago but continued to pursue the franchisor because they claimed that McDonald’s should be equally responsible as a joint employer for the wage violations because the company provided the computer system to its franchisees to set employee schedules and determine rates of pay (including overtime). Based on that fact, they contend that McDonald’s was controlling employee pay through the computer system. These two judges on the nations most liberal appellate court appeared to disagree, but took the case under advisement.