DOL Tips Rule Nears Release in Latest Eleventh-Hour Deregulation

[octoberlib]

The restaurant industry’s years-long push for eased regulations on paying tipped workers for time spent on side work that doesn’t generate gratuities is closer to reality just as the Trump administration is about to exit.

The U.S. Labor Department has submitted a long-anticipated final rule to the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in a notice appearing on the agency’s website Thursday. This is typically the final major step before the rule can be released to the public.

If finalized as proposed, the regulation would allow employers to pay tipped employees the lower minimum wage of $2.13 per hour regardless of the amount of time they spent on non-tipped duties, such as rolling silverware or cleaning their work stations. This would withdraw the department’s previous interpretation that workers, such as servers and bartenders, must be paid the full federal hourly minimum of $7.25 when spending at least 20% of their workweek on tasks that don’t yield gratuities from customers, rather than the base pay of $2.13 for tipped occupations.


Completing this rule before President Donald Trump leaves office Jan. 20 would represent a victory for the hospitality industry and management attorneys by shielding them from an increasingly common form of litigation in which workers allege they’re owed back pay for hours working on non-tipped duties when they didn’t earn at least $7.25



https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/dol-tips-rule-nears-release-in-latest-eleventh-hour-deregulation

[Sherman A1]

1. One suspects that even if enacted in January

It will not stand for very long.

[Laelth]

2. Naturally, it's a pro-owner, anti-labor interpretation.

Sickening.

-Laelth