My introduction to overtime came many years ago when I had my first full-time job as a sports editor. I was also the photographer, the page designer, the headline writer and helped deliver lunches to a dozen or so staff members every Wednesday because they were too busy to go out for lunch.
During football season I’d work days Monday through Friday, then cover a high school game Friday night and a college game Saturday. If both games were at home, I’d normally put in a 60-hour week, and that included developing film and making photo prints Sunday afternoons.
Overtime regulations were put into place in 1938, but 45 years later they hadn’t been put into place in the tiny paper I worked at in Mississippi. You did the job, no matter how long it took, and you signed for 40 hours a week on your time card – 8-8-8-8-8. A lot of the extra hours were of my choice, and the boss knew it. The time cards were his legal protection.
I wanted to make it as a sports writer, and my 60-hour weeks were going to get me where I wanted a lot faster than 40.
Anyway, years later I took over at The Salem News. After a couple years, I let the staff know that we were going to start filling out time sheets. There were a lot of exemptions and exceptions to the 40-hour week, but I firmly believed anyone working more than 40 hours should be paid for 40 hours.
At first, there were a few employees thinking I was forcing the time cards on them to make sure they worked 40 hours. But after a few years I believe we all realized it was the fair thing to do and protected them.
A week or so ago the Obama administration announced a new plan that declared workers were working longer hours for less pay, and that effective December of this year, anyone earning less than $47,476 a year would be eligible for overtime. The current number is $23,660 a year.
I’m already paying overtime to everyone who works more than 40 hours (outside of me and anyone who is related to me!), so I don’t have a financial dog in this hunt.
But I know a lot of newspaper and small business people who do. That’s a huge jump with only a six-month notice, and perhaps not so ironically during a presidential election year.
Many small newspapers and other types of small businesses have key employees who get paid for a 40-hour workweek and work more. Every one of those businesses is not run by Ebenezer Scrooge.
Will Obama’s rule help the middle class or hurt it? Can employers afford to pay more, or will they simply cut hours? Will a dependable employee happy with a $33,000 a year salaried job find themselves working hourly for $29,000? We aren’t just talking about big corporations with CEOs bringing in multi-millions, we are talking small businesses where the owner might make slightly more, perhaps less, than a key employee.
I don’t really see this new $47,476 threshold as an answer to cure the issue of a dwindling middle class. As an example, I was an apprentice of sorts at that small newspaper, working a lot for a little, but within a couple years I moved into the ranks of the middle class. Had I not been able to hone my skills on my time, I might have stayed where I was forever. Are we hurting incentive?
I’m not for slave conditions, and I back up that claim by paying every employee for every hour they work. I’m just saying we better be careful what we ask for. In case you haven’t noticed, the employment formulas they throw around in Washington are sometimes a lot better at getting votes than actually creating jobs and wealth.
