while reading C&G again (i own the second printing, in the soft cover format), I noticed page 75 in the insert: "However, Klaus should have three employees in his shop for it to function properly since his leadership should be half of his swordsmith ability.lacking one assistant substract 3 labor points from klaus regular 33, leaving a net total 30".
Where does this come from?
I re-read labor point chapter page 38 again, and the craft chapter, and did not read anything about a penalty to labor points when you do not have "enough" assistants. When speaking about assistants, C&G only list them as potential bonus.
I've always read it as:
"A master can employ a number of assistants equal to or less than his Leadership score. A master who does not employ a number of assistants at least equal to half his Craft score sees his seasonal Labor points penalized by 3 for each missing assistant." Otherwise of two otherwise identical masters, the one with the higher Leadership is penalized, which should not be the case.
I would also add that I houserule the reduction to be not 3 Labor points per missing assistant, but points per missing assistant: 6 for Wealthy characters, 3 for "Normal" characters, and 2 for Poor characters. In other words, every missing assistant reduces the masters' effective Craft Score by 1. Otherwise Poor craftsmen, all else being equal (including number of assistants), the better they get at their craft (i.e. the higher their Score) the poorer they become (i.e. the fewer the Labor points accumulated). Again, this should not be the case.
Finally, I would add that I think Klaus' example is faulty. His Craft Score is 6+2, so he'd need 4 assistants, not 3.