[USA] Dept of Labor wants to increase overtime exempt threshold

[Feronar]

So the Department of Labor is pushing a proposal to increase the threshold at which someone can become exempt from overtime pay requirements. The proposal is to increase the threshold from ~$24k/year to ~$50k/year.

http://www.dol.gov/whd/overtime/NPRM2015/

For those of you who don't know, maybe don't live in the US, workers who make salaries above a certain threshold, currently $23,660 (£15,247 or €21,208) per year, and have certain duties, typically management, executive, or other professional tasks, are "exempt", meaning overtime pay laws don't apply to them. The proposal seeks to raise that threshold to approximately $50,440 (£32,505 or €45,212) (Numbers given vary by source, typically between $47k and $52k). Furthermore, that amount would be automatically indexed to inflation each year.

[Garnier Fructis]

Sounds good to me.

[Conspicuous Cultist]

Not too shabby.

[Gorgodeus]

This is Obama's doing. He has been calling for this for some time now because of employers working in retail being abused by their employers. They love to promote workers to "manager", put them on salary, and then work them 60-80 hrs a week, while all they are doing is stocking shelves, unloading trucks etc.

[Garnier Fructis]

This is Obama's doing. He has been calling for this for some time now because of employers working in retail being abused by their employers. They love to promote workers to "manager", put them on salary, and then work them 60-80 hrs a week, while all they are doing is stocking shelves, unloading trucks etc.

If you can't work without being paid, then you just need to work harder and work more or else you're too lazy to pull yourself up.

[Danshot]

i love it, thank you obama. honestly it should be different state by state, 50k in cali ain't the same as 50k in MN

[Gorgodeus]

If you can't work without being paid, then you just need to work harder and work more or else you're too lazy to pull yourself up.

Wth are you even trying to say?

[Garnier Fructis]

Wth are you even trying to say?

Preemptively poking fun at the "poor people are lazy" crowd who will be joining us eventually.

[Wildtree]

If you can't work without being paid, then you just need to work harder and work more or else you're too lazy to pull yourself up.

hehehe.....

[Utinil]

I think the government needs to work on fixing the exemptions before it worries about raising the amount (which needs to happen too). Government employees, for example, are paid based on their grade (ie GS11). The government will pay a GS11, normal pay for the first 40 hours, then will pay the mandatory 1.5x overtime pay, but at two grades lower. This basically means a GS11 will make the same pay per hour regardless of how much they work.

The agriculture business is another area that seriously needs fixing. I understand that farms have large stretches where people have to work 80+ hours and I can understand exemptions for that. This is abused by greenhouses and nurseries that have the same load all year long. My son worked at one where every single week he had to work 60+ hours with no overtime. This nursery exclusively sold trees to walmart.

[Captain N]

This is a good thing. It's not quite OT over 8 -- but it almost guarantees that most mid-level managers won't be taken to the cleaners by their employers.

[Gheld]

Ot exempt at 27K? Jesus that's insane. In Canada it's like 84K (2X industrial average salary )