CIRT joined 110 organizations representing businesses, states, municipalities, universities, and non-profits to formally request the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) hold stakeholder meetings PRIOR to the development and issuance of a notice on new rules related to overtime requirements for salaried employees.
The importance of this potential new rulemaking is the target: “exemption of bona fide executive, administrative, and professional employees from the Fair Labor Standards Act’s minimum wage and overtime requirements” (also known as the “white collar” exemption). This exemption strikes at the heart of CIRT member firms – which have a large number of these so-called “white collar” or salaried exempted employees in their workforce.
DOL had intended to simply issue an Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, without prior discussion, picking-up a highly controversial and rejected Obama-era arbitrary “one size fits all” significant rulemaking, particularly with respect to the numbers of employees affected, cost for labor, and difficulty to implement – never mind the impact to the workforce norms.
NOTE: Effective Jan. 1, 2020, President Donald Trump's administration raised the salary threshold to $35,568 from $23,660 at the time. While the Biden DOL has not stated how high it plans to raise the salary requirement to still be exempt from overtime payments, Congressional members and allies have urged it be by over 100% to at least to $82,732 by 2026.
SEE Attached Letter for details
[BACKGROUND STORY: JULY 3, 2015 – Overtime Rule Changes for SALARIED Employees (WERE) Proposed President Obama is touting a proposed rule change that may affect millions of “salaried/exempt” employees that heretofore were not eligible by dent of the “duties test” and their pay levels for overtime. The Department of Labor (DoL) is planning to use its authority under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (which allows it to do so without Congressional approval) to adjust/change the amount of pay a “salaried” employee must receive to be still “exempt” from overtime pay. Currently, firms that pay salaried workers less than $455 a week (or $23,660 a year) must pay overtime to them, even if they meet the “duties test” (i.e., they are correctly classified as executive, administrative, and/or professional employees). DoL proposes to increase the salary level threshold to $50,400 per year (or approximately $970 per week) thereby increasing the number of “salaried” employees eligible for overtime (some estimate that would mean about 40% of salaried employees) – again, notwithstanding if they meet the “duties test.” The ambitious timetable for this proposed change is for it to take effect on the first of January 2016 (merely a coincidence it is a presidential election year].
