Bronco_Beerslug
08-06-2004, 09:05 AM
How anyone that has to work for a living could possibly think of voting for Bush is beyond me.
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President Bush's assault on overtime pay continues. His administration has already issued rules – scheduled to take effect August 23 – that will strip overtime pay from an estimated 6 million workers (http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/briefingpapers_bp152). Yesterday in Ohio, President Bush touted two new proposals which go by the deceptively appealing names "flex time" and "comp time." Bush claims that the proposals are motivated by a concern for working mothers and other members of the work force with demanding schedules. In reality, the proposals would allow businesses to have their employees work more than 40 hours a week without getting paid overtime.
CURRENT LAW ALREADY ALLOWS FOR FLEXIBILITY: Current law does not prevent an employee and an employer from negotiating a schedule where the employee works, for example, 50 hours one week and 30 hours the next. The employer is simply required to pay time-and-a-half for the extra 10 hours in the first week. "Comp time" (http://www.epinet.org/briefingpapers/familyf_bp_1997.pdf) would allow the employee to "choose" to substitute the extra pay for additional time off. It opens the door for employers to pressure workers to "accept time off instead of overtime pay." Even absent explicit pressure, employers would be free to "channel overtime work to those who were willing to take comp time." Moreover, "employees would have to take their earned time off when it suits their employer rather than when it suited the employee."
FLEXTIME MEANS NO COMPENSATION AT ALL FOR LONGER HOURS: Bush's other proposal – "flex time", would allow employers to set work schedules on an 80-hour, two-week period. This is essentially a mechanism for employers to schedule overtime without providing any overtime compensation. Like comp time, it promotes irregular work weeks that may reduce workers' income or reduce leisure time.
EMPLOYEES FINANCE INTEREST-FREE LOAN TO EMPLOYER: Comp time proposals that have been introduced in Congress would permit employers "to deny use of comp time for a year or more." The effect would be that employers would "receive an interest-free loan from their employees, while workers who gave up premium pay would get shortchanged by devalued banked comp time." If some of the banked comp time hours end up unused, "the employees are likely to wind up working longer annual hours than they would have without a comp time program." AFL-CIO President John Sweeney explains, "comp time is 'paid leave' only in the sense that it is 'paid for' by the workers' own lost overtime earning, minus interest.
LESS EXPENSIVE OVERTIME MEANS MORE OVERTIME: Allowing the substitution of time off for overtime will "lower the marginal cost of scheduling overtime" and "intensify the economic incentives for employers to lengthen the number of overtime hours scheduled per week." (http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/briefingpapers_comp) The result would be longer and more unpredictable work weeks – a development that is anything but "family friendly."
PUBLIC SECTOR IS NOT A GOOD MODEL: Advocates of comp time note that it has been available for some time within the public sector. But that doesn't mean it is a good idea for the private sector. Specifically, "there is a real danger of losing comp time accruals [in the private sector] in the event of a business failure." For example, In 2000 – when the economy was still booming – 550,000 U.S. businesses closed. Also, "the relative absence of unions in the private sector leaves employees vulnerable to employer abuse." Finally, since private sector employees are not required to provide any paid leave for vacations at all there is nothing than would "prevent an employer from reducing or eliminating the paid leave it provides now and substituting comp time in its place."
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President Bush's assault on overtime pay continues. His administration has already issued rules – scheduled to take effect August 23 – that will strip overtime pay from an estimated 6 million workers (http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/briefingpapers_bp152). Yesterday in Ohio, President Bush touted two new proposals which go by the deceptively appealing names "flex time" and "comp time." Bush claims that the proposals are motivated by a concern for working mothers and other members of the work force with demanding schedules. In reality, the proposals would allow businesses to have their employees work more than 40 hours a week without getting paid overtime.
CURRENT LAW ALREADY ALLOWS FOR FLEXIBILITY: Current law does not prevent an employee and an employer from negotiating a schedule where the employee works, for example, 50 hours one week and 30 hours the next. The employer is simply required to pay time-and-a-half for the extra 10 hours in the first week. "Comp time" (http://www.epinet.org/briefingpapers/familyf_bp_1997.pdf) would allow the employee to "choose" to substitute the extra pay for additional time off. It opens the door for employers to pressure workers to "accept time off instead of overtime pay." Even absent explicit pressure, employers would be free to "channel overtime work to those who were willing to take comp time." Moreover, "employees would have to take their earned time off when it suits their employer rather than when it suited the employee."
FLEXTIME MEANS NO COMPENSATION AT ALL FOR LONGER HOURS: Bush's other proposal – "flex time", would allow employers to set work schedules on an 80-hour, two-week period. This is essentially a mechanism for employers to schedule overtime without providing any overtime compensation. Like comp time, it promotes irregular work weeks that may reduce workers' income or reduce leisure time.
EMPLOYEES FINANCE INTEREST-FREE LOAN TO EMPLOYER: Comp time proposals that have been introduced in Congress would permit employers "to deny use of comp time for a year or more." The effect would be that employers would "receive an interest-free loan from their employees, while workers who gave up premium pay would get shortchanged by devalued banked comp time." If some of the banked comp time hours end up unused, "the employees are likely to wind up working longer annual hours than they would have without a comp time program." AFL-CIO President John Sweeney explains, "comp time is 'paid leave' only in the sense that it is 'paid for' by the workers' own lost overtime earning, minus interest.
LESS EXPENSIVE OVERTIME MEANS MORE OVERTIME: Allowing the substitution of time off for overtime will "lower the marginal cost of scheduling overtime" and "intensify the economic incentives for employers to lengthen the number of overtime hours scheduled per week." (http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/briefingpapers_comp) The result would be longer and more unpredictable work weeks – a development that is anything but "family friendly."
PUBLIC SECTOR IS NOT A GOOD MODEL: Advocates of comp time note that it has been available for some time within the public sector. But that doesn't mean it is a good idea for the private sector. Specifically, "there is a real danger of losing comp time accruals [in the private sector] in the event of a business failure." For example, In 2000 – when the economy was still booming – 550,000 U.S. businesses closed. Also, "the relative absence of unions in the private sector leaves employees vulnerable to employer abuse." Finally, since private sector employees are not required to provide any paid leave for vacations at all there is nothing than would "prevent an employer from reducing or eliminating the paid leave it provides now and substituting comp time in its place."