New Overtime Rules Start Monday

This is a tragedy, but if America is going to be a competitve job market in the world it has to take steps like this. Our standard of living is the best in the world, and that is why corporations are leaving. The corporations only care about profit and so they are influencing the government to take measures like this. This is just another indicator of who is really in charge in America, it's not the people's government, it's the corporations.

Originally posted by blanketgirl
Doesn't there come a point where a person is making enough that it gets silly to pay them more? My company has employees that cost about $80/hour for us to have on overtime (and those are the blue collar carpenters!)

Thats part of the point, supply and demand. carpenters get a high rte because thier skills are needed and they are in demand. Just because someone is "blue collar" why can't they earn a decent living part. if you are keeping them above and beyond thier regular work week. I am a registered nurse. My base rate is about 49 an hour. If the hospital req me to work overtime, that puts my rate at around 75 and hour. Am I being overpayed? I think not.

In this specific case, they are choosing by themselves to work that overtime, then later they turn in the hours. They do it whenever they need extra money for something- not on company demand and we are required to pay as they worked it.

Trust me, carpenters are not in demand (at least not around here) and my point with "blue collar" was that often I don't believe people realize that careers in which the workers tend to believe they are broke and underpaid often are doing much better than they realize, and the local union trains them very well to whine about how they don't have enough. One of our employees recently qualified for a "low-income" loan which gave him special lower rates based completely on the fact that he was in the union- when he easily doubles my income and I don't even qualify- these individuals have been trained to believe they are being taken advantage of. (This is doubling me even with him having 3-4 months laid off during the year)

If you are a nurse I do feel for you, and you are probably being screwed over because of the pharmacudical (spelling?) companies being really bad people compounded with a lawsuit-happy society. (I would doubt it is for hospital benefit in the end) For the most part, I do think people should get overtime pay rates if it is required of them, but I have never known that to be the case with anybody I've known.

Originally posted by FredT

Originally posted by blanketgirl
Doesn't there come a point where a person is making enough that it gets silly to pay them more? My company has employees that cost about $80/hour for us to have on overtime (and those are the blue collar carpenters!)

Thats part of the point, supply and demand. carpenters get a high rte because thier skills are needed and they are in demand. Just because someone is "blue collar" why can't they earn a decent living part. if you are keeping them above and beyond thier regular work week. I am a registered nurse. My base rate is about 49 an hour. If the hospital req me to work overtime, that puts my rate at around 75 and hour. Am I being overpayed? I think not.

In response to it coming up-
Don't you think that the cost of living is going up because of wages going up? Doesn't that have some part in it? If you have to pay your employees 2x the pay, it costs more for you to produce the goods, so you need to charge more. When you take the approach of constantly raising wages it will just raise exponentially out of control.
It's like talking to your grandparents about how a coke was 5 cents- back then that was a lot of money!

So I ask anyone reading:
If you want people to make more because the cost of living raised, what is your solution to the cost of goods and services produced raising alongside the wages?
The answer that those at the top would make less profit doesn't work out in the end because eventually it would become stupid to own the company when your employees are tripling your income, and business owners would rapidly close their doors and go get jobs. Who wants to put all their own property on the line when they can trick someone else into doing all the hard part for them?

Blanketgirl I think you are missing the point of this. The idea is to prevent corporate abuse. Without the penalty of overtime they are free to overwork/abuse their staff because they are inept and do not properly staff their workforce. As for voluntary OT. If the company doesn't want to pay OT then don't let your people work it. Its that simple. Don't try and get legislation to cover for your gross incompetence. And if your employees are making more money than you its probably because you are a bad business manager. Again don't blame other people for your own faults. Own up and accept responsibility. Why should a business benefit by overworking their staff? The ONLY person that should benefit is the person being overworked.

It boggles my mind as to why they would enact legislation that they are unsure as to the outcome. My guess is that they know exactly what they're doing and just don't want to admit to it. They are taking away any incentive to strive to do your job well and lowering your income in the proccess.

"For example, professional employees exempt from overtime had professional degrees. The new rule allows employers to substitute work experience and instruction."

This is scary. You're only doing your job and you get penalized for it. That's equivalent to saying if Barry Bonds hits 55 HR's this year, next year he has to take a pay cut. How insane is that?

Intrepid... this new law is the most insulting piece of legislation to pass in recent memory. I have to blame the Bush administration for this one. This was the most disgusting case of selling out that I have ever seen. He completely sold out the American worker for the sake of taking care of business. I hope this loses him the election. I don't care for Kerry or the Democrats but anything is better than this crook.

I do understand that point-
But preventing corporate abuse is no more important than preventing individuals from abusing the corporation. (do you understand that?) I believe legislation like this comes up because too many people ARE crossing that line. Every time someone demands something, there has to be someone to give it up.

There comes a point when both sides have to give something. Employees making more than the business owner is becoming a problem because you are required to pay them X amount and to be competitive (keep cost of living down) you can't charge more than so much...

When people decide that they want more hours but don't want to get another separate job so they are going to request more hours- the employer shouldn't have to suffer.
This is just the reverse of the situation when the employer chooses to overwork someone so they don't have to hire- whoever is being stubborn and selfish should be the one to pay- it shouldn't be the employer when it isn't their choice. Why should an employee benefit from abusing their employer any more than the other way around?

Specifically with the employees and OT- it's not that simple. if an employee just clocks in longer than they are supposed to or just doesn't leave the job site on time- would you suggest they just don't get paid if it wasn't okayed? I'm sure that would go over well- NO, you have to pay them the overtime and there really isn't anything you can do... Well, you could fire them then pay them unemployment for the next 6 fiscal quarters... yeah... because that isn't self-defeating!

Originally posted by Indy
Blanketgirl I think you are missing the point of this. The idea is to prevent corporate abuse. Without the penalty of overtime they are free to overwork/abuse their staff because they are inept and do not properly staff their workforce. As for voluntary OT. If the company doesn't want to pay OT then don't let your people work it. Its that simple. Don't try and get legislation to cover for your gross incompetence. And if your employees are making more money than you its probably because you are a bad business manager. Again don't blame other people for your own faults. Own up and accept responsibility. Why should a business benefit by overworking their staff? The ONLY person that should benefit is the person being overworked.

And I'm still waiting for an answer to how to actually fix the problem of the cost of living going up as wages do- so how would you fix that upward spiral? How does EVERYONE making more through OT or higher wages actually help?

Blanketgirl, I think that we can always find specific cases where overtime may be abused, but the laws were put in place to protect nurses like FredT and workers in other industries where overtime is part of the job. Many people are now in jeopardy of being abused by their employer, as well as the fact that their salary will decrease--many people were hired under the assumption that they would be working overtime and they expected a certain weekly income. Combine that with the fact that gasoline prices are rising, taxes are rising in many cases, and the cost of living is increasing and that is a recipe for disaster for many people.

The average wage across the U.S. has decreased for most people (see www.americanprogress.org...), however the other components of cost per employee are increasing, due to insurance, facilities costs, healthcare, admin costs, etc. To put further downward pressure on wages will worsen the economy--the focus should be on the other components of the equation, particularly healthcare costs. Unfortunately, it is much easier for employers to focus on wages and reducing benefits, especially when the prevailing government is pro big-business.

It is hard to feel sympathy for businesses when the Bush administration has more than crossed the line when it comes to providing corporations with incentives to improve profit margins. Admittedly, it is the government's responsibility to ensure that the laws strike a balance between providing business incentives to prosper and protecting employees and the environment, but when we see legislation enacted designed to put workers at risk, repeals 20 years of environmental protections, and sees the greatest amount of tax rebates being granted to corporate America in recent history, I think that we have gone too far and in the wrong direction.

This legislation is a prime example--putting overtime in jeopardy directly targets the middle income bracket, who are the same people who are asked to pay over $2 a gallon for gas, have had their real estate taxes raised, payed more income tax, payed more for healthcare premiums, will face skyrocketing heating bills this winter, probably have jobs that are in jeopardy, have had to pay more for their kids school clothes, and have been traumatized by terrorist alerts. Haven't these people compromized enough?

Originally posted by blanketgirl
I do understand that point-
But preventing corporate abuse is no more important than preventing individuals from abusing the corporation. (do you understand that?) I believe legislation like this comes up because too many people ARE crossing that line.

That doesn't make sense. The company has the power--they have the ability to fire you and replace you. If you abuse the company (steal, lie etc), they can let you go and the laws are on their side. If the company abuses you and there are no laws that protectyou, you have no recourse. You have to either live with the abuse or quit. Labor law is necessary to prevent abuse of this power.

When people decide that they want more hours but don't want to get another separate job so they are going to request more hours- the employer shouldn't have to suffer.

Huh? The business owner controls their business--if they can't afford to pay employees more hours, why would they? The employer should just deny the request. This has nothing to do with the law--the law applies when management requires employees to work.

Specifically with the employees and OT- it's not that simple. if an employee just clocks in longer than they are supposed to or just doesn't leave the job site on time- would you suggest they just don't get paid if it wasn't okayed? I'm sure that would go over well- NO, you have to pay them the overtime and there really isn't anything you can do... Well, you could fire them then pay them unemployment for the next 6 fiscal quarters... yeah... because that isn't self-defeating!

This is mismanagement. If your employees are cheating you out of overtime, it is your responsibility to rectify the problem, not creating laws that effect everyone. This has nothing to do with the government. My mother works for Macy's and they are given a set number of hours to work in advance. If they clock out beyond those pre-determined hours, they are reprimanded (and they don't get payed for the extra time unless it was pre-approved.) Too many reprimands, and they are fired. This isn't self-defeating--this is getting rid of employees who are stealing from you.








[edit on 23-8-2004 by lmgnyc]

All this comes down to the same thing another way for this administration to give more power to big business, this is not the first time during bush rule that he has benefit the business corporations over the working population in this country.

So now people if you don't fall in "overtime" category either not to work over your time and get a part time job that pays a littler bit more or forget about the extra money for Christmas you were working on.

Originally posted by marg6043
All this comes down to the same thing another way for this administration to give more power to big business, this is not the first time during bush rule that he has benefit the business corporations over the working population in this country.

Exactly Marg. They might be getting worried that he won't get re-elected and have to line their pockets once again before the election.

Yes, the company can fire you- but then they have to pay your unemployment. I'm not sure if you know that when the state pays you unemployment- they basically send the bill to your last employer, so now they have to pay you not to work. hence - self-defeating to fire someone. (it is slightly more complicated, but the employer ends up paying it, not the state)

With the more hours- I mean if someone says "I need 44 hours this week so I can afford X" The employer should be able to give them 44 hours for the employee's benefit without having to pay them time and a half for those extra hours. They did not demand that the person work more, they asked to work more and the employer is being generous enough to give them the hours because they wanted them. It is for their benefit not the employer's.

Yes, I understand OT pay should be paid when it is asked of the employee. I have said this in almost all of my posts.

As much as it may seem that way, when small businesses are involved the law really is on the employee's side. You can fire people, but it will cost you, they can try to sue you and you still end up having to pay them. Why bother? I can either keep the 1st crappy employee and suffer, or go through 2-3 to find a good one, and now be paying a whole person's wage just in unemployment costs... plus my new employee's wage. either way the company is screwed and the people who will be lazy make out the best- paid vacation and they can just say they are looking for work... (I've watched it happen, my parents used to hire family friends, needless to say they aren't friends anymore)


It is illegal to not pay someone while they were on the clock, even if your policy said it had to be approved. If there were there and working, you have to pay them. I don't know how Macy's gets around that, but small businesses don't get that sort of benefit.

This is extremely edited, but what I'm responding to:

Originally posted by lmgnyc
That doesn't make sense. The company has the power--they have the ability to fire you and replace you. If you abuse the company (steal, lie etc), they can let you go and the laws are on their side.

Huh? The business owner controls their business--if they can't afford to pay employees more hours, why would they?

This is mismanagement. If your employees are cheating you out of overtime, it is your responsibility to rectify the problem, not creating laws that effect everyone. This has nothing to do with the government. My mother works for Macy's and they are given a set number of hours to work in advance. If they clock out beyond those pre-determined hours, they are reprimanded (and they don't get payed for the extra time unless it was pre-approved.) Too many reprimands, and they are fired. This isn't self-defeating--this is getting rid of employees who are stealing from you.
[edit on 23-8-2004 by lmgnyc]

Overtime ONLY APPLIES TO HOURLY EMPLOYEES. The extremely wealthy are not usually HOURLY EMPLOYEES.

Originally posted by groingrinder
Overtime ONLY APPLIES TO HOURLY EMPLOYEES. The extremely wealthy are not usually HOURLY EMPLOYEES.

And they get performance bonuses. When's the last time you got a bonus? This is just another way to keep the working class down.

Originally posted by intrepid

Originally posted by groingrinder
Overtime ONLY APPLIES TO HOURLY EMPLOYEES. The extremely wealthy are not usually HOURLY EMPLOYEES.

And they get performance bonuses. When's the last time you got a bonus?

This is just another way to keep the working class down.

You are right salary employees do not have to worry about this pay check cut that this administration is doing to middle class Americans.

Does any body know that the middle class is the largest in this country, if you work in a low end job you don't have to worry either.

Salary employees depending were they work or what company the work for it get bonus and incentives like stock options, while hourly employees that is about the majority of the working force does not get anything from the company and now thanks to bush policies against middle class they are getting the biggest pay cut in history.

I guess in bushes eyes his economy is doing so well that he can take away money from the average american.

Originally posted by blanketgirl
In this specific case, they are choosing by themselves to work that overtime, then later they turn in the hours. They do it whenever they need extra money for something- not on company demand and we are required to pay as they worked it.

You most certainly aren't required to allow them to work as many hours as they want. If you are a company and you allow your employees to work past the standard (40h in US) then you pay overtime. This new law is, from what I understand, supposed to rearrange who gets overtime, basically eliminating it for some supervisory positions. However, someone (I think you, no?) said it was only restricting overtime for people who make 100 thousand dollars a year.


Also, what makes anyone here think that any employees are entitled to overtime in the first place? Or even a minimum wage? Those aren't rights, they're aspects that have be garnered by labour over the decades. I am certainly not saying that these things should be done away with, and I -really- think its a lot of b/s to tell a nurse who works 70-80 hours a week on 14-15 hour shifts that she isn't allowed to get paid time and a half for any portion of the workweek over 40 hours. These people aren't working because they are greedy, they need the money. If people thought there was a nursing shortage before, well this definitely won't help.

marge10...:
You are right salary employees do not have to worry about this pay check cut that this administration is doing to middle class Americans.

Salaried employees dont -get- overtime in the first place. They aren't affected, because they don't receive overtime. They also can't form Labour Unions and can't negogiate contracts as a group.

IOW, everyone gets screwed, all the time, not just now.

[edit on 23-8-2004 by Nygdan]

Nygdan,

you know I agree with you now with this new rule I guess nurse not only are going to be on the short list but they are going to disappear.

Most working class people work extra to make that extra money with the overtime to make end meet.

It's good to see somebody acknowledge that overtime isn't some sort of god-given right for once...

I was thinking, if nurses (take FredT for example) are making about 49/hr-
That puts his income (BEFORE overtime!) at 102k/year!
He is in the top 12% of income earners in the country with just 40 hours/week!

How is this middle class?!?
The median US income is hovering in the 40k's right now- aren't these and the people making less those we should worry about? The bottom 50%- the ones who are without question given overtime by this bill?

When we have a 12% poverty rate- we shouldn't be worrying about the 12% wealthiest people in the country getting their extras rather than possibly getting rights or something better for the other 80% struggling to get to where they are.

This 12% figure counts on him also being the only wage earner in his household! Forget about being even that "broke" (because top 12% is broke... yeah) if he has a spouse or child of age to work raising his household income.

I know not all nurses are making that much- but really before we use him as an excuse for why some of the wealthiest workers in the country need more, why don't we look at the whole picture?

OT is not a right, it is there to protect the workers at the lower end of the pay scale from abuse because they need the money too badly to complain about being overworked, not as a random perk for the wealthy. It shouldn't really be given to the wealthy- if you can get a job that pays that well and your employer is unfair, you can quit- if you got that good of a job you can do it again! If you feel taken advantage of by your employer- go elsewhere!

If someone making over 100k/year "needs" the money, they should rethink their spending habits! People survive on 1/5 of what they have who are doing just fine!

I am making about 1/3 their income, am raising a 1 year old completely on my own, (no help from anybody) am in the process of buying a house and consider myself to be doing well. BTW- I don't get OT pay, nor do I feel I am entitled to it just because some random guy decided nobody should work above 40/week in the US...

Statistically they are taking the OT from the top of the pay scale and giving it to the bottom end where it is needed- maybe it can help us not need to pay out so many government benefits to the poor so our taxes can go down without causing a deficit.
But if you would rather keep money flowing non-stop to the wealthy by giving them every benefit under the sun while complaining that they are middle class- what percentage of the population do you consider middle class???

Originally posted by Nygdan

Also, what makes anyone here think that any employees are entitled to overtime in the first place? Or even a minimum wage? Those aren't rights, they're aspects that have be garnered by labour over the decades. I am certainly not saying that these things should be done away with, and I -really- think its a lot of b/s to tell a nurse who works 70-80 hours a week on 14-15 hour shifts that she isn't allowed to get paid time and a half for any portion of the workweek over 40 hours. These people aren't working because they are greedy, they need the money. If people thought there was a nursing shortage before, well this definitely won't help.
[edit on 23-8-2004 by Nygdan]

blanketgirl,

Yes not all the nurses make that much, at least the ones I know, they are overworked and underpay here in the area I live, it is a shortage of nurses.

A two year nurse will not make 40 something and hour, and that is what you get around here. so they work overtime to make the money and they are overworked and underpay.

It shouldn't matter how much he makes. OT keeps employers honest because without it he will be overworked. He has a right to be with his family too. I promise you that the unethical people that run/ruin business in this country will exploit the new law. If you work 40 hours a week you have time to spend with your family. You really want some spineless idiot working you 60 hours a week because he is to dumb/cheap to hire additional people because he is so greedy that he doesn't want to pay benefits for a 2nd person because if he is paying benefits for additional works he can't buy himself a bigger boat. Whether a person makes $10 an hours or $100k a week they have a right to spend time with their family. This doesn't just impact people making $100k a year. This impacts anyone with a degree (or almost anyone).

This OT problem has less to do with the employee making more money and more to do with keeping dishonest employers remotely honest.

And where FredT lives also determines what that $100k is worth. If its in Florida then its darn good money. If its in parts of California or NY it really isn't all that much. Unless FredT is a masters level nurse I'd speculate we are talking about a very high cost of living area. An RN will make about $20 to $25 an hour under normal circumstances. With today's cost of living and the cost of an education and the responsibility they have and considering the supposed shortage that really is low compensation in my opinion.