but no matter what is said there are people out there who say screw that I want/need the O/T because either my base pay is crap or they spend more than they earn.
tech-line you don't have to be one of those people. You restrict your hours and you will have nothing to worry about. There is nothing to say you have to work all these silly hours.
I do a little (Approx 6hrs a month over the year) to stay within the agreement of my contract of employment (which states a reasonable amount of O/T is expected). I for one agree that there should be a restriction on the hours you work; like you cannot certify after after a certain number of hours.
So I sort myself out and do the minimum overtime and maybe someday a legal resriction, that you cannot opt out of, comes into force.