This morning Bush's Labor Dept. passed new regulations governing overtime pay. Here is the article, my are comments below:
linky
Quote:
White House - AP Cabinet & State
New Overtime Rules at a Glance
1 hour, 33 minutes ago Add White House - AP Cabinet & State to My Yahoo!
By The Associated Press
Highlights of the Labor Department (news - web sites)'s new overtime regulations taking effect Monday:
_Workers earning $23,660 annually or less are eligible for overtime pay for working more than 40 hours a week. The department says about 1.3 million workers will be newly eligible.
_White-collar workers earning $100,000 or more a year are newly exempt from overtime pay.
_Changes to duties that determine whether an employee is a professional, executive or administrative and exempt from overtime will result in "very few, if any" workers losing overtime. Critics disagree, saying 6 million could lose overtime.
_ Union workers covered by contracts will not be affected by the change.
_ People identified as generally exempt from overtime pay include pharmacists, funeral directors, embalmers, journalists, financial services industry workers, insurance claims adjusters, human resource managers, management consultants, executive and administrative assistants, purchasing agents, registered or certified medical technologists, dental hygienists, physician assistants, accountants, chefs, athletic trainers with degrees or specialized training, computer system analysts, programmers and software engineers.
Department officials say employers should determine on a case-by-case basis.
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Here is a
link from an "AP Labor Writer" with even less information on the new legislation.
We saw last week that Bush's tax policies have shifted the tax burden to the
middle class, now it seems Bush is interested in juggling even more election-year dynamite. It will be interesting to see which news sources swallow the Bush PR team's Orwellian spin that this will increase the number of people earning overtime, or simply that this is a positive move for business/the economy/etc. If anyone wants to explain how eliminating large swaths of overtime-eligible jobs will increase overtime pay I'm all ears.
Quote:
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_ Union workers covered by contracts will not be affected by the change.
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Yeah, until the contract expires in a few years after which the union will no longer have strong legal grounding to insist this be a part of future contracts.
The new laws make all overtime pay vulnerable to a simple change in job titles. E.g. secretaries are now "Administrative Assistants," sorry no overtime for you. We've seen this before with fast food and box store (Walmart) employees becoming "managers" at 50+ hours per week (w/no O.T.). Can anyone explain why any of the jobs listed above should not be eligible for overtime? Chefs? Athletic trainers? Dental assistants? Don't be naieve and think that a corporation like McDonalds is above making every burger slinger a "chef" and therefore ineligible for overtime.
Is this just hubris on the Bush administration's part (
"I can gut any law benefiting workers and no one will care!") or are they desperate for business community support? Before we launch in to a withering philosophical treatise on the history of overtime (although I wouldn't really mind that either roachboy
) I'd like to hear people's real life experiences with overtime, managers and employees alike, related to this new legislation.