By GREGORY N. HEIRES
If Republicans get their way, private-sector workers can expect to have their overtime pay curtailed.
A Republican-backed bill under consideration in the U.S. House of Representatives would allow employers to offer hourly workers the option of taking compensatory time instead of receiving time-and-a-half overtime pay.
Workers would have the right to decline the offer. But the new arrangement would clearly tip the balance of workplace power to supervisors.
Workers who now regularly enjoy paid overtime would likely suffer pay cuts as their employers assign work to others willing to accept comp time instead of the extra compensation.
The proposed Working Families Flexibility Act (H.R. 1406) would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act so that it would no longer require private-sector employers to pay hourly employees who work more than 40 hours at time-and-a-half their regular rate.
The legislation, introduced April 9 by Rep. Martha Roby (R-Ala.), would permit employers to offer their workers comp time at a rate of 1.5 hours per hour of overtime worked. Both parties would need to agree in writing to the comp time arrangement.
Republican-supporters say the measure would encourage flexibility in the workplace and describe it as family-friendly. But clearly, the proposed law would undermine the intent of the FSLA, which aims to discourage employers from overworking their employees and to expand job opportunities to workers.
Able to circumvent mandatory overtime, employers will be able to boost earnings. With a new supply of workers accepting comp time, they will have less reason for hiring. So, we’re talking about job-killing legislation.
The AFL-CIO views the bill as part of the four-decade-old effort by Republicans to end the 40-hour workweek.
Worse yet, opponents say the bill reflects a grander scheme of anti-labor conservatives who seek to roll back worker protections and benefits built up over decades by unions and progressives. That effort includes stripping the collective bargaining rights of government workers, eroding public-employee pensions, crushing industrial unions, shifting the cost of health-care coverage to workers, and putting troubled municipalities under the control of unaccountable financial managers who can throw out union contracts.
“For some workers, having extra paid time off is actually more valuable than money,” said Roby, when the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections of the House Education and the Workforce Committee approved the bill on April 11. “The law shouldn’t make it more difficult for working people to budget their time so they can see their child hit a home run or attend a parent-teacher conference.”
The committee vote reflected party lines. Twenty-three Republicans supported the bill, and 14 Democrats opposed it. Republicans have introduced the bill in previous sessions.
The ranking member of the subcommittee, Rep. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.), suggested that the proposed law is nothing less than an attempt to cheat workers out of their overtime pay.
“We are wasting committee time debating legislation that forces workers to compromise their paycheck in order to have more time off work,” he said.
“This bill has nothing to do with promoting workplace flexibility,” Courtney said. “It is about not paying overtime. It is about saying to hourly workers already struggling to make ends meet–if you need time off to care for a sick child or attend a school concert, you need to work extra hours, forgo the earned overtime pay, and then, as long as it is not disruptive to your employer, you may get some time off.”
“Quite simply, H.R. 1406 would be a step in the wrong direction,” said Judith L. Lichtman, senior advisor of the National Partnership for Women & Families, in her testimony before the House subcommittee.
Instead of building on the success of policies such as the Family Medical Leave Act, she said that, “paid sick days standards and a fair minimum wage which provide workers and their families with the time off and the financial stability they need, this ‘flexibility’ bill offers forced choices and false promises.”
Posted on www.thenewcrossroads.com on April25, 2013.