George W. Bush Eliminating Overtime Pay for 6 Million Workers

[gldstwmn]

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRe...eleaseID=35003

GEORGE W. BUSH: ELIMINATING OVERTIME PAY FOR 6 MILLION WORKERS

On Monday, August 23rd, six million US workers will lose their right to overtime pay. Workers are already working harder and not getting ahead. Millions of families rely on overtime pay to pay the bills and make ends meet. The new Bush rule will cost these workers hundreds of dollars a month, making it harder to get ahead.

BUSH'S REGULATION CUTS OVERTIME FOR 6 MILLION WORKERS:

New Bush Overtime Rules Change the Criteria for Overtime. The new overtime rules change the criteria for how employers are to determine overtime for their employees. "The administration- drafted rules redefine the criteria that determine which administrative, professional and executive employees get federally mandated time-and-a-half pay after 40 hours...A wide swath of occupations, including some registered nurses, nursery school teachers, store and restaurant managers, computer workers, funeral directors and chefs are likely to lose their eligibility for overtime pay." (Knight Ridder, 8/19/04)

After Public Outcry, Bush Barely Made Changes. The first overtime rule was met with widespread opposition from millions of Americans, including firefighters and nurses, who were to lose overtime. Despite this outcry the overtime regulations going into effect on August 23rd are only slightly better and still will cut overtime for over six million. "The original version of these rules, proposed by the Bush Administration in March 2003, would have stripped overtime protection from eight million workers. In the face of widespread public opposition, the administration promised that its final version of the rules would correct this problem, a promise it has failed to keep." (EPI, "Longer Hours, Less Pay," 7/14/04)

Regulations Make More American Workers Exempt from Overtime Pay. According to an analysis by three former Labor Department officials of both Democratic and Republican administrations, "It is our conclusion that, with the sole exception of the salary level adjustment, in every instance where the Department has made substantive changes to the existing rules...it has weakened the regulatory criteria for, and thereby expanded the reach and scope of, the (overtime) exemptions." (Fraser, et. al., "Observations on the Department of Labor's Final Regulations," 7/04)

Bush's Cut to Overtime Goes Farther Than Congress Intended. The nonpartisan report on overtime also found that the regulations, "moves the line of demarcation between those employees protected by the FLSA and those who are exempt substantially in the direction of exemption, so that more classes of workers, and a greater proportion of the workforce overall, will be exempt than we believe the Congress could have originally intended." (Fraser, et. al., "Observations on the Department of Labor's Final Regulations," 7/04)

EFFECT OF THE NEW OVERTIME RULES:

Different Types of Workers Lose Pay:

-- 2.3 million office employees could lose overtime rights under a change that makes so-called "team leaders" ineligible, even when they don't supervise others.

-- 1.4 million workers who will be reclassified as executives under the new rules, even though they do little supervision and a great deal of manual or routine work.

-- 920,000 workers without a college or graduate degree could lose overtime eligibility because the Bush administration is changing the definition of who is a "learned professional."

-- 548,000 low-level supervisors could be denied overtime protection by being paid on a salaried basis instead of an hourly basis.

-- 30,000 nursery school teachers will lose the right to overtime pay. (EPI, "Longer Hours, Less Pay," 7/14/04)

Bush Administration Exaggerates Overtime Extension. The Bush administration has claimed that 1.3 million workers will be exempted for the new salary cap. Their estimate is nearly 1 million more workers than expected. "The new rules will only guarantee overtime pay to an additional 384,000 employees earning less $455 a week - 916,000 less than the 1.3 million the Bush administration has claimed." (EPI, "Longer Hours, Less Pay," 7/14/04)