Last Chance for Overtime

[Stone_Spirits]

Last Chance for Overtime

Bush's case for changing overtime rules has been discredited. So why can't the Democrats stop him?

By Bradford Plumer

August 12, 2004

Conventional wisdom has it that a politician should never pick fights with the middle class, especially with an election just around the corner. Yet the Bush administration has done just that, creating new rules, due to come into effect on August 23, that will strip up to six million white-collar employees of their right to overtime pay. Shockingly, the White House may well get away with this. What gives?

When the administration first proposed its new overtime rules last spring, the Labor Department argued that the planned changes would do two things. First, they would raise the salary bar below which employers must pay time and a half, from its archaic, sub-minimum wage level of $8,060 to $23,660 a year. Such a long-overdue change could, in theory, entitle an additional 1.3 million low-wage workers to overtime benefits. Nobody seriously questions this number. So far, so good.

The trouble lies with the second big change. The rules governing overtime pay have always included a "duties test," determining which workers do and do not qualify for overtime pay. For instance, under the current criteria, in place since 1938, cooks and registered nurses must receive time-and-a-half for overtime work because they do not hold professional degrees. On the other hand, executive chefs and doctors are exempt. The criteria aimed to distinguish independent professionals from "grunt" workers, and compensate the latter for long hours. But the new rules will blur this distinction -- many cooks and nurses will now be ineligible for overtime pay, even though they often lack college degrees. The Labor Department has downplayed all this by claiming that only 100,000 white-collar workers would be adversely affected by the new classification system.

That claim was false. In June of 2003, the labor-friendly Economic Policy Institute (EPI) blew open the administration’s numbers with a study indicating that, in truth, up to 8 million workers could lose their right to overtime under the new criteria. (Under the current system, about 80 percent of the nation's 120 million workers are eligible for overtime.) After union leaders raised havoc, the Labor Department tinkered with the regulations, claiming that they had fixed the aberrations. But in July of this year, the EPI released another study arguing that 6 million workers would still lose their rights under the final regulatory changes. A day earlier, an independent study by three former Labor Department officials came out, expressing similar concerns. The officials, who had served under both Democratic and Republican administrations, criticized the new regulations for "remov existing overtime protection for large numbers of employees" and for "fail to protect and promote the interests of working people."


-more-
http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2004/08/08_402overtime.html

[Spinzonner]

1. They're adjusting a hard limit with one hand

and giving the companies a tool to avoid it with the other. Typical Bush misdirection.

[UdoKier]

2. Thank you for posting this. If Kerry doesn't use this, he's a FOOL.

I was under the impression that under the new rules, a McDonald's manager could change the title of the french fry person to "assistant manager of fired foods" with no pay raise, and would no longer have to pay overtime. Is this incorrect?

[Massacure]

5. Kerry doesn't need to use it.

Most people will notice it on their own.

[UdoKier]

6. What country do you live in?

Most people in the lower income brackets don't bother to vote, and a huger people in the upper third couldn't care less about their overtime. Then the ones in the middle are so preocccupied with Fear Factor and Laci Peterson that they scarcely notice.

This overtime issue has been around for over a year now, and I've never heard ANYONE but my friend who are politics junkies mention it.

Compare the number of people who have a general idea that Kerry "flip-flops" to the number who are aware of these overtime changes, and you';; see what I mean.

[G_j]

3. with everything else going on

I almost forgot about this. I guess that was the intention..

[Eric J in MN]

4. so what is the status of this? nt

nt

[rucky]

7. details on this website:

http://www.workingamerica.org/issues/ot.cfm

[Stone_Spirits]

16. thank you

very helpful :-)

[Robbien]

8. They go into effect on August 23rd

It was very hard at the time to get anyone to pay attention to what Delay and his buddies were pushing through.

[Nimrod]

9. I AM a white-collar worker

And I rely on overtime to pay rent. A general thought process seems to equate "white-collar" with "mucho bucks". Last year I made $26,000 before taxes in a city with an average yearly cost of living of $53,000. This was working an average of 45 hours a week. I worked in a financial department and from November to January I averaged about 55 hours a week. I relied on my end of year overtime income to catch up on bills accrued during the year.

Most "white-collar" workers get paid about a dollar more an hour than a fry cook. We're just grunts who know how to type. In any company employing 100 white-collar workers, 90 of those workers will be living below the poverty line already.

This is just more money being handed to the megacorps. I don't know what I did to Bush to make him hate me so much, you'd think he caught me in bed with his wife or something.

[elehhhhna]

10. This issue is enough to destroy the BA. Where's the outcry?

Where are the DEMOCRATS???? Anybody care to guess how lowering workers income will affect tax & social security revenues?

This ruling is a JOB KILLER. Why hire another employee when you can just spread the extra hours around AT NO COST? NO COST. No OT pay, no extra hourly wages, no health insurance premiums.

If the Dems can't pickup on this issue, they deserve to lose.

[G_j]

11. which makes me wonder

just what exactly does "middle class' mean?
Can one live below the poverty line and still be middle class?
I've never been very clear on what middle class is.

[Nimrod]

12. I don't really know

It seems more like a buzzword than anything else. "Yeah, you're eating peanut butter and top ramen six days a week, but you're middle class so be grateful for what we've allowed you to have."

I'm guessing if you're able to come up with enough money for both food AND shelter you're "middle class" and can afford to be screwed over.

[G_j]

14. well that is probably the best answer

there is. Food and shelter.. I thought I grew up middle class, but then it seemed that you were gradually improving your situation, setting money aside for the kid's college etc.
I doubt if many of today's "middle class" are setting money aside for the future.

[Atman]

13. Where is it that nurses aren't degreed?

Christ, I wish my wife had known that. It would have saved many years of tuition costs!

AFAIK, even an LPN needs at least an Associate degree. What hospitals are doing now is retraining janitors and orderlies to be "multi-skilled workers" who can run simple tests and do basic nursing duties but still get paid shit for it. Maybe THEY will still get their overtime pay. Unless they have a degree in Janitorial Science.

[Nimrod]

15. Conspiracy theory #4248

The elimination of overtime further separates the classes. The so-called "middle class" had found a narrow, thorny route around the class wall. Can't get any real wages, but if you work yourself to death you might just barely make enough money to invest, give your children an education, and compile a teensy bit of equity.

This scares the living hell out of the ruling class. Theirs is a members-only society and they're not accepting applications right now. On top of that, someone who's actually found a way to live comfortably might someday have enough spare time on his hands to notice our overlords' criminal activites.

They are protecting themselves. This is just another string of barbed wire put on top of the class wall.