New Overtime Laws Devastating to Middle- and Lower-Income Americans

NOW Blasts Bush Administration for Leaving Millions of Working Families Behind; New Overtime Laws Devastating to Middle- and Lower-Income Americans

August 23, 2004

"Today, over 6 million working Americans will begin to feel the effects of the Bush administration's latest American holiday—'Wal-Mart Appreciation Day,'" said NOW President Kim Gandy, who joined Senators Tom Harkin and Arlen Specter, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, and hundreds of union employees in a joint press conference this afternoon outside of the Department of Labor. "This is simply an election-year handout to the president's allies in corporate America. We're here to tell George W. Bush that no way will we work for no pay!"

Bush's Department of Labor has won changes to the Fair Labor Standards Act that will now deny overtime pay to millions of workers. Analysis by the Economic Policy Institute shows that non-management salaried workers will lose their right to overtime pay, along with hourly workers who are at risk of being shifted to salaried employment with invented "responsibilities" in order to evade overtime pay requirements.

This new law will especially hurt women. Some of the female-dominated positions suffering from this legislation include paralegals, nurses, cooks, secretaries, retail clerks, computer operators, health care contract workers, and non-unionized support workers. A large proportion of these workers are parents who rely on overtime pay to keep their families afloat.

The Department of Labor's proposed changes would especially hurt women and single heads of households who must juggle their work schedules with daycare and family responsibilities.

"The Bush administration is sacrificing working families on the altar of corporate greed," said Gandy. "We are witnessing a concerted and interconnected campaign to undermine 65 years of fair labor law and worker protections. Bush and conservative leaders in Congress have set out on a course to save their large, corporate donors millions of dollars by removing troublesome workers from overtime coverage; cutting down on expensive lawsuits with stricter 'class action' requirements; adding 'new' workers eligible for overtime to cover their tracks."

"In their effort to help large companies such as Wal-Mart and Clear Channel Communications avoid paying overtime as well as expensive lawsuits, the Department of Labor is removing the overtime protections from the very workers who have been filing lawsuits when they have been illegally denied their time and a half overtime pay," said Gandy.

"All families are struggling to make ends meet in this poor economy—especially single mothers. What happens when she has to work several hours of overtime a week in her so-called 'management' position but doesn't receive proper compensation to pay for the babysitter?" asked Gandy. "This results in burning a huge hole in her pocketbook."

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