4 million lose overtime pay and Republicans rejoice the ‘victory’ for small business

[Spectral]

Can anyone help me understand people's perspective on this:

I'm not clear on the reasoning for the arbitrary salary cut lines; provided a business isn't dropping below minimum wage, I'm not sure why we'd be inclined to pick a number above which they must pay extra pay unless it just applied universally. If someone believes that there's a right to additional compensation when working more than X hours, it's not clear to me why that right would apply at $40K, but not at $70K.

Just a "those people have enough" mentality?

I'm not being snarky - I don't understand what's driving the position that there's a certain amount of pay where overtime should be required, but over some threshold it's fine to require much higher hours without additional pay.

I'd also be curious whether this will impact graduate students and postdoctoral fellows or whether those jobs will fall outside the bounds of this. There are a lot of postdocs that make ~$42K and work 60+ hours on a regular basis.

[Felya]

Why the left feels it is inhumane to allow employers and employees to negotiate private contracts between themselves is beyond me.

It's not liberals and it's not beyond you either. Just think of why undocumented workers are working for cheaper and you'll connect the dots. You are not a special snowflake...

[Spectral]

...let's not kid ourselves ... pro male, pro christian... pro wealthy...have all been Republican ideals for awhile.

The horror. Can you believe them? They're probably pro white too! Ugh, wealthy male Christians... gross!

[Total Crica]

Why the left feels it is inhumane to allow employers and employees to negotiate private contracts between themselves is beyond me.

Well, when you don't have any other choice but to dig ditches for a dollar an hour or rob the nearest store so you can at least feed yourself on 3 hots and a cot, I wouldn't call that a "negotiation".

[Puremallace]

<-- was supposed to go hourly but job is keeping me at salary position. Not too bad honestly because I do not do a fucking thing except for play on the internet for 7 hours a day. Guess if they wanted me to work they would pay me more but until then I can care less.

[Spectral]

Then their business model is flawed and likely that's proof positive our economy has issues.

I see this and similar claims to it often when higher minimum wages or other regulation come up and it really seems like a cart before the horse line of thinking. Making up a new rule and then saying that an already existing business was flawed because they didn't meet the new regulation is pretty self-serving.

[iperson]

Obama appointed judge blocks obama's unconstitutional overreach and it's trumps fault. Don't look now OP, but your stupid is showing...

[Spectral]

Obama appointed judge blocks obama's unconstitutional overreach and it's trumps fault. Don't look now OP, but your stupid is showing...

It might be time for a "Thanks Trump" meme to be spawned...

[Paranoid Android]

Usually I take a pro-business stance, but I believe that people should be paid adequately for their work, and if you work over 40 hours a week, you should get overtime, period.

I get the arguments against salary pay getting overtime, but I still don't agree with it.

Anyway, I'd tell people, if the company you work for wants to stiff you overtime pay, work somewhere else.

Please! Do not state this crap. Most people do not have the ability to go from one job to the next.

[Gmollster11]

This is Such BS, Unions protect workers with everything written in the contract, so laws changing like this overtime thing would be a non issue.... I mean shit one could write a novel about the Practical and Current day benefits that exist in unions that Non union workers don't have. Here's the facts, employers don't care about the welfare of the work force, they care about their shareholders, shareholders care about the bottom line. Workforce is simply a cost to them, and they will minimize this cost down to the point where they will at least have a workforce. The problem is because unions have lost favor with the populous due to brainwashing by corporations as them being nothing but "lazy" the working class has come to accept shit working conditions as the norm, Crap Pay and Crap hours.

Hell even the concept of overtime after 40 is THANKS to unions. There where no laws about this shit back in the day, unions fought for it to make it happen.

I appreciate your passion, as you really believe this. The reality is unions are far more harmful than good. If they were actually better, they would be growing not disappearing.

[ArguesWithStrangers]

How is wealth not a finite thing? You are limited by number of hours you can work. Years you can work. Amount the company or you can make. Amount of goods that can be shipped. Amount of capital that exists. Amount of materials that can be harvested. Etc.

There's a limit on the amount of money that exist or it pushes the value of the currency to zero. Everything is limited. How there there be infinite wealth when all the factors creating it are finite?

- - - Updated - - -

It all boils down to this in the US.

Vote Democrat you are voting for welfare for the poor
Vote Republican you are voting for welfare for the rich.

Wealth is not finite. It can be created from an idea, or from trade. Take some of the recent innovators in our country such as Steve Jobs, or Mark Zuckerberg. They created, or massively expanded, entire industries. In so doing they employed every person and enabled every investment and every subsequent innovation that resulted. Did they become amazingly rich as a result? Sure, but the money they made was not taken from those who also made money, but made less of it. Everyone's life was improved, and Mr. Jobs and Mr. Zuckerberg are not villains because they profited more than others.

[Molis]

I took a salaried job and understood the Pros and Cons.

They tricked me into taking a salary job is not an excuse.
Salary or Exempt employee's do not get overtime end of story.

I took a net cut in pay at the time to further my career and stabilize my work/life balance.

I worked in a union for 8 years during high school and college. It is not that great.
I much prefer controlling my own negotiating.

[zenkai]

4.2 million Americans lose overtime pay and Republicans rejoice the ‘victory’ for small businesses
(title altered to fit)

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7433096.html

Here is a better source that actually explains shit.

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-w...rtime-pay-rule

With just over a week before it was scheduled to take effect, a federal judge has blocked the implementation of an Obama administration rule that would have extended overtime eligibility to some 4 million Americans.

The Labor Department's sweeping overhaul to the overtime rule required employers to pay time-and-a-half to their employees who worked more than 40 hours in a given week and earned less than $47,476 a year.

That salary threshold is about twice what currently allows workers to be exempted from overtime. As NPR's White House Correspondent Scott Horsley told our Newscast Unit, supporters of the rule called it "long overdue" as inflation took its toll on overtime protection.

So basically it only affected Salary workers who made over 47.5k a year which is way above what the average income is.

[Jaylock]

It seems that many people in this thread don't understand how simple economics works.

Example:

A small business has 10 workers, each worker gets 7.50 an hour to do menial tasks like cashiering, sweaping, making sandwiches, wiping down tables, etc. And the small business owner can only afford to pay them the minimum wage because it takes all 10 to keep the little shop running. He pay's them 7.50 an hour because it takes no real skill to perform the tasks they were hired to do. Now, mr big government comes by and tells small business owner, "you must pay all your employees 15. an hour so they have a "livable" wage!" So mr small business owner now has to make some decisions. Either fire half his workforce to pay the doubled rate to the remaining 5 employees, or increase the price of what he sells to compensate for the increased wage expense he just now incurred if he keeps 5 of his workers.

If it is a sweeping mandate that all businesses must adhere to, then simple economic logic would dictate that there will be a reduction in jobs, or a straight cut of jobs in the market, and / or increased prices on all consumer and retail goods to compensate for the increased price of employing people. The reality is that a combination of both will occur.

So now what do we do about all these people without jobs? How does the government fix that problem? Oh a basic income wage from the govt? Paid for by mr. and mrs tax payer? Oh yeah that solve all problems! Take more money from its citizens who actually are productive and work, and give to those who just got laid off because the business' were forced to double their wage expense for menial jobs by the federal government?

Oh yeah! lets just blame it all on the republicans! They are the evil bigots who hate everyone and only want to see people suffer!

[Tijuana]

4.2 million Americans lose overtime pay and Republicans rejoice the ‘victory’ for small businesses
(title altered to fit)

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7433096.html

So, if this were to have passed, the theory is that millions of workers who negotiated salaries based on overtime, would have seen huge increases in pay over what they agreed to.

However, this obviously would not have resulted in workers making a cent more. It would have resulted in workers working less than what they agreed to, and then a pay cut to follow shortly. (overtime laws are actually indented to shorten the work week, not increase the pay)

I get it if the government wants to interfere with the lowest paid workers. However, the notion that they can come in and effectively renegotiate salary worker contracts after the fact, is just not reality. There is no magic wand you can waive that gives workers everything they want, without harming them, or the companies that provide the platform by which they earn their living.

This is a classic example of liberal thinking that does not extend past the passage of the law.

[Logwyn]

Wealth is not finite. It can be created from an idea, or from trade. Take some of the recent innovators in our country such as Steve Jobs, or Mark Zuckerberg. They created, or massively expanded, entire industries. In so doing they employed every person and enabled every investment and every subsequent innovation that resulted. Did they become amazingly rich as a result? Sure, but the money they made was not taken from those who also made money, but made less of it. Everyone's life was improved, and Mr. Jobs and Mr. Zuckerberg are not villains because they profited more than others.

No. The amount they can make is finite. Its ruled by the laws of economics. You have a limits on everything used to make such wealth from capital to labor.

Mr Jobs is a great example. He's creating zero wealth as he's dead. At some point in time something will replace the PC and no long will the wealth created by the PC be made.

Hell. If wealth is so infinite. Why don't we just print everyone 5 million bucks in the USA and make everyone wealthy?

[Elegiac]

If it is a sweeping mandate that all businesses must adhere to, then simple economic logic would dictate that there will be a reduction in jobs, or a straight cut of jobs in the market, and / or increased prices on all consumer and retail goods to compensate for the increased price of employing people. The reality is that a combination of both will occur.

Which is totally why we're seeing rampant unemployment in states with high minimum wages. This isn't supported by actual, real world examples of the minimum wage in action - primarily because the increase in prices is negated by the net gain in buying power for most people, and because businesses don't hire people to do things so trivial that a wage increase would negate the need for that thing being done.

Moreover, from an ethical standpoint; if you cannot afford to pay your workers, you cannot afford to run a business, period.

[Kellhound]

Which is totally why we're seeing rampant unemployment in states with high minimum wages. This isn't supported by actual, real world examples of the minimum wage in action - primarily because the increase in prices is negated by the net gain in buying power for most people, and because businesses don't hire people to do things so trivial that a wage increase would negate the need for that thing being done.

Moreover, from an ethical standpoint; if you cannot afford to pay your workers, you cannot afford to run a business, period.

Welfare is better than higher minimum wage, it is better at redistributing wealth.

[Nemrod]

Good move.

When small businesses thrive, Americans thrive.

When small businesses thrive, the owners of small businesses thrive.

[Elegiac]

Welfare is better than higher minimum wage, it is better at redistributing wealth.

They are aimed at solving two different sets of issues.