Wondering what’s become of the FLSA overtime revisions the feds have promised to issue? Don’t worry, you haven’t missed them. The DOL just keeps pushing back their release.
Initially, after President Obama issued an executive order telling the DOL to rewrite the nation’s overtime exemption rules, the agency assigned a date of proposed rulemaking of November 2014 to the regulations.
But shortly before that soft deadline, the agency said the proposed revisions were “months away.”
The feds then said the nation could expect the proposed rules sometime in February. But February’s long since been in the rear-view mirror, and still we’ve seen nothing.
So what’s going on?
In a hearing held by the House Education and Workforce Committee to discuss President Obamaâs 2015 budget proposal for the DOL, the agency’s Secretary Thomas Perez provided testimony that touched on a number of topics, including the proposed rewrites to the overtime rules.
While being somewhat tongue-in-cheek, Perez said that his agency is “working overtime” to get the proposed changes on the table, but nothing was imminent. However, he did indicate that they could be made available “sometime this spring.”
Perez also offered no clues as to what the revisions may look like, but he did indicate that the salary threshold would be a point of emphasis.
Threshold to rise significantly
As you know, the current minimum salary a worker has to be paid to be exempt from overtime is $455 per week or $23,660 per year. Well, the Obama Administration and Perez have openly said that threshold is no longer relevant in today’s economic environment.
As a result, it’s going to increase and, most likely, pretty significantly.
Earlier this year The Huffington Post reported that Ross Eisenbrey, vice president of the Economic Policy Institute, an organization that holds a lot of sway with Democratic policymakers, told the news outlet that his talks with White House officials have lead him to believe the threshold will be increased to somewhere around the $42,000 mark.
The Post’s report said that, according to Eisenbreyâs calculations, a $42,000 threshold would cover 35% of salaried workers. Thatâs a far cry from the 12% of salaried workers covered by the existing threshold. Still it wouldn’t make as many employees OT-eligible as some smaller firms had originally feared.
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill had been estimating the threshold would increase to $51,000 — an amount that had been advocated by the likes of Vice President Joe Biden and former chief economist Jared Bernstein. That threshold would make somewhere in the neighborhood of 47% of salaried workers OT-eligible.
Stay tuned: When the proposed rules are issued, we’ll have a full breakdown.
For more HR News, please visit: Whatâs going on with those FLSA overtime revisions?
Source: News from HR Morning