Business Owners Concerned About New Overtime Law Proposal

[Brigid]

http://touch.wishtv.com/r2709/b12ee672

Small business owners around Indianapolis are griping about Obama's proposal to change overtime pay rules. God, this is so typical of this low-wage, anti-worker state where employers are used to cheap, powerless labor.

[LiberalEsto]

1. All the IT contracting companies must be freaking out

Forcing IT workers to put in unpaid 60-plus-hour weeks is routine in the industry and has been for decades. They not only don't get overtime, they don't get regular pay.

This will provide companies with a nice excuse to lay off more American IT people and bring in more cheap foreign labor under the H1-B visa scam.

[AZ Mike]

2. It would make sense to gripe if....

....the changes were discriminatory (e.g., to one group of businesses or type of industry), but it's a broad change for all employers across all industries. The fact of the matter is that this change will induce hiring - assuming that businesses want to meet the demands of their market.

Anything less is just employers cutting their noses off to spite their face.

If an employer has three employees working 52 hours per week with no O/T, they are receiving 1.3 weeks worth of labor for 1.0 week worth of pay. Those 1.3 days include the associated productivity of the time spent working. Therefore, the employer gains 3.9 weeks of productivity at 3.0 weeks of cost. If the employer wants to meet that productivity level to serve his or her market, he or she will need to hire someone to cover the 0.9 week of labor - otherwise, pay time and a half to the existing employees.

More time off or more money for existing workers. More demand in the economy. More customers to the business. More hiring.

It's a win-win in my view.

[yeoman6987]

3. I wonder what they would do with the military personnel

Goodness some work up to 80 hours a week easily. I wonder if they would exempt the military from these rules.

[bluedigger]

7. The military has never been subject to such regulations, for obvious reasons.

You get 30 days paid leave a year, and Uncle Sam owns you the rest of the time, 24/7. I think LEO's and some other occupations are also exempt. I know my friend in the Border Patrol is already whining about it.

[Aerows]

4. A brief history of corporate whining

[madinmaryland]

6. Your post deserves at least 1000 recs!!

Thanks!

[FSogol]

9. Make that an orginal post, please. n/t

[Aerows]

10. Done

They whine every time any single thing is suggested to improve worker's rights and declare it the "end of my business!".

[etherealtruth]

5. Of course they're whining ...

... they may actually be compelled to pay low wage workers for the hours they work! we can't have folk being paid for the hours they work

[madville]

8. Here's how the employers handle it

Employee makes $50k a year salary and works 60 hours a week.

Convert $50k annual salary to an hourly rate of $14 an hour. 40 hours + 20 hours of time-and-a-half overtime = about $50k a year. Problem solved right?

Then during slow times they can cut the overtime and make $30k a year for their 40 hours, gets better and better for the employers.

Negative I know but they're already throwing it around I'm sure.

[seveneyes]

11. That would be my guess

And as usual, the middle class worker drops down another notch. Things should be getting better for the middle class since 2008, but I'm not seeing it.