Earn $455/wk? No overtime for you! - Page 2 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

Kuan · #16 08-24-2004, 08:39 PM

I don't think much has changed except that the different classifications have been clarified. The $8060 lower limit has been inflation adjusted and the upper limit probably affects very few. The upper limit of 100k probably affects few, but as luck would have it, it affects one of our members. What are the odds eh?

There will probably be dispute about what constitutes "significant input in the hiring and firing of employees" and other unobjective criteria. Still, the law has been spelled out a little better for those who need to know exactly who qualifies for overtime and who does not. I cannot imagine why certain classes of worker are treated different than others, there has to be a reason but I can't think of any. Perhaps someone can give it a shot.

blackmercedes · #17 08-24-2004, 10:12 PM

The reason for regulating overtime is to distribute the labour. Over the last 100 years or so we have seen the work week drop from 80 to 40 hours. This is not meant to punish companies, but to simply put more people to work keeping the total labour hours the same. More people working less hours per week.

Why do this? Well, we have had enormous gains in productivity over the last 100 years, crashing through various industrial revolutions. With those leaps, we have reduced the amount of labour input hours required for producing goods and services. If we had not reduced the work week, we might have 20% unemployment today.

During the 1920's we had a huge rise in productivity and little gain in consumption to match. Suddenly, as the decade drew to a close, there was an over-supply of production and lack of demand. Whoops! FDR was presented with a plan to cut the work week to 32 hours, or even 25 hours a week in an effort to bring the US out of the sustained depression. He was about to do it when the plan was scrapped at the last minute and the "New Deal" was implemented. Too little too late. Without WW2 sopping up all the productivity capacity, we might have been in the depression for many years longer than it was.

mikemover · #18 08-25-2004, 01:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lebenz

Hmmm. Would you say that's true for minimum wage as well?

Yes.

All of us have encountered minimum wage workers (McDonald's, grocery store, convenience store, etc.) who are not even competent enough as employees to deserve $4.75 an hour, or whatever the minimum is now...

Employers should not be forced to pay more for an employee than the employee's contribution is worth.

But wait! That's not all! Here comes the new overtime regulations, and now they're also forcing employers to pay productive employees LESS than they are worth!

Mike

TX76513 · #19 08-25-2004, 07:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikemover

The terms of compensation should be STRICTLY between an employer and and employee. Government has no reason, nor should they have the right, to stick their nose in it.

Mike

That's the was it's done in sweatshops and 3rd World Countries so it got to be right?

Kuan · #20 08-25-2004, 07:58 AM

In reality, it's not the customer at McFood who determines the worth of an employee. It's return on labor dollars. HR folks frown upon talking about the "worth" of an employee anymore because it implies that they're somehow the property of the employer. They like to keep it objective... nakes it less personal when it comes to hiring and firing.

But I get Mike's point. Some people just aren't cut out to be order takers at McDonald's. In most cases the bad fit is discovered and the relationship severed rather quickly. McDonald's did not become the world's largest fast food chain by hiring incompetent people. Likewise with other enterprises such as grocery stores.

On a personal note, most of the, "better" employees at our local McDonald's seem to be people who can't speak proper English. They speak enough English to take your order and process it quickly. They seem to get the job done better than the pimply faced kid who's there just for the summer.

Kuan · #21 08-25-2004, 08:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by blackmercedes

The reason for regulating overtime is to distribute the labour.

Maybe I'm not seeing it, but registered nurses are now ineligible for overtime according to the Dept. of Labor. We already have a shortage of nurses, seems counterintuitive to me.

blackmercedes · #22 08-25-2004, 09:34 AM

In Canada, we have overtime laws that are designed to protect employers and rip off employees. As an example, anyone that is "management" (you - manage the fryer) is not restricted to the 44 hour work week and is not to be paid overtime, regardless of hours worked.

Nurses have a powerful union here, and have managed to keep themselves in a situation where they are paid hourly, and are paid overtime. They are one of the few semi-professional people that are in such a situation. Perhaps the new US nurse-clause is about moving them to salaries and no longer paying overtime.

The relaxation of the overtime and work week laws in Canada (pressure from business) is one reason why we cannot get our national unemployment rates below 8%.

kerry · #23 08-25-2004, 09:56 AM

John:
The situation is not so different here. I saw a news interview with a Radio Shack employee commenting on the issue. He said he had been 'promoted' to management in order for the company to avoid paying him overtime which would have been required had he not been promoted.

I like your line of thinking on this question. I think we can find common ground between the immigrant despising right,and left leaning labor unions. If we changed the workweek to 25 hrs instead of 40, there'd be full employment and no reason for people to cross the border looking for US jobs anymore and the immigration problem would be solved. We could put Pat Buchanan and John Edwards on the same ticket.

rickg · #24 08-25-2004, 11:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by webwench

What trade are you in? I'm looking for a career change, and I like the cut of your paycheck

Maybe my statement was misleading

I meant the "over $100k" part eliminated me and anyone in my trade :p
I'm a machinist. I just barely clear $40k a year, and I've been at it almost 20 years. Shop foremen in big shops just might approach $100k with bonuses and bennies, but I wouldn't want their job for any pay.
Lousy pay, but I can drag my toolbox to any part of the country and get a job.

mikemover · #25 08-25-2004, 12:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TX76513

That's the was it's done in sweatshops and 3rd World Countries so it got to be right?

People in the US do not, and would not, work under "sweat shop" conditions and/or pay. To think that we need laws here to "prevent" such things in the present day is ridiculous.

On the other hand....Contrary to what most people in the US believe, people in 3rd world country "sweat shops" are HAPPY to have ANY work at all....Admittedly many of them have unsafe conditions and long hourse, but at least it gives people who started with NOTHING some food money and some shred of hope of a better life.....When they go in and shut down sweat shops, they are returning those people to a life of NO income, and NO hope.

Mike

TX76513 · #26 08-25-2004, 01:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikemover

People in the US do not, and would not, work under "sweat shop" conditions and/or pay. To think that we need laws here to "prevent" such things in the present day is ridiculous.

Mike

Mike probably not in the traditional sense of the word sweat shop - but the language in the new regulations are very severe to industry segments. e,g. telemarketers, and conveniece store employees and like low wage employment.

kerry · #27 08-25-2004, 01:53 PM

Mike must live in a totally different world than mine. I wouldn't call it a 'sweatshop' (perhaps a no-sweatshop) but higher education since the mid 1980's has decided to pay people much less than a living wage.
Most colleges are now staffed with part-time faculty. At my school over 75% of courses are taught by part-time faculty. In my department 90% of the courses are taught by part-time instructors. For teaching the same amount of classes as a full-time faculty member teaches, a part time instructor makes $15500 per year. Does anyone consider that anywhere near a living wage in the USA? In my department, virtually all the instructors have Ph.d.'s so it's not a matter of lack of education.
By the way, in Colorado it is illegal for faculty members of community colleges to collectively bargain which I assume means it is approaching Mike's utopia.

el presidente · #28 08-25-2004, 02:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry edwards

a part time instructor makes $15500 per year.

Elementary school teachers make more.

Tell me, do most part-timers do any other sort of work to earn money (other jobs, tutoring, etc.?)

kerry · #29 08-25-2004, 03:06 PM

Some of them teach a lot more classes than a full-time faculty member, at a number of different schools in order to survive. Some hold other jobs. (I managed a condominium complex while a part-time instructor teaching around 18 courses a year) There are no benefits with that $15500. If they were permitted to buy into the benefit program, family health coverage is $800 per month, this would leave them with $5900 to survive on for the year.

blackmercedes · #30 08-25-2004, 03:27 PM

I am always surprised by the "we have evolved past that" argument when it comes to labour laws, monetary and fiscal policy, etc. "It can't happen here now.."

Well, poor working conditions were once the norm in North America, and only got better thanks to unions and labour legislation. If we were to remove those controls, business would begin to degrade conditions, and would create sweatshops once again. Look at Wal-Mart. They have much better working conditions than offered by employers in third world nations, but they barely meet the bottom end of the legal limit. They have few full time employees, use friction methods to keep employees from switching to higher wages (drug testing, wage withholding terms, etc.) and push the laws to the edge wherever possible. If we relaxed the laws, employers like Wal-Mart would immediately begin to slide downhill farther.

Anyone read "Nickled and Dimed?" It's an interesting peak into the world of minimum wage in the US. Conditions in Canada are the same, or worse. The only real advantage that Canadian minimum wage workers have is that they have public health care.