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Two years ago, the Obama administration introduced an effort to update rules surrounding federal wage and hour standards incorporated into the Fair Labor Standards Act. The result of that effort will begin to be felt near the end of this year. It won’t stop there.

First, some background: On Dec. 1, the final rule, which was released by the Department of Labor in May, will more than double the salary threshold for overtime pay eligibility from $455 per week to $913 per week — $47,476 per year. According to the DOL, this rule will “put more money in the pockets of middle class workers — or give them more free time.”

Several lawmakers in the House and Senate disagree with this sentiment — and they are right to express concern. As written, the new rule not only threatens personal upward mobility and burdens small businesses, but hinders nonprofit organizations, colleges and universities from serving their communities.

This is why H.J. Res. 95, introduced by Rep. Virginia Foxx, chairwoman of the House Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Training, bears serious consideration.

In a utopian society unaffected by the laws of economics, the new DOL rule would make sense. In varied scenarios: more formerly exempt management and other workers would begin earning overtime, they might get a raise to meet the new threshold or they might get more time off from work.

But, since the cost of doing business is unlikely to change in the next six months — the allotted time that business owners have to prepare for the new rule — in a real-world scenario, the reality will be much different. Two of the “best” outcomes may be that a worker gets no more pay, but is restricted to an eight-hour day and unable to fully engage in a career that demands more than that for the opportunity to gain promotion, or will get no more pay but still work long hours as employers lower base hourly wages to offset the increase in overtime pay.

Neither of these scenarios truly benefit the American worker, and indeed, by stifling workplace flexibility, hindering employees from climbing the economic ladder, harming the young by placing them in a path of increased college costs and fewer job opportunities, jeopardizing services for those in need and crafting new hurdles for small business job creators, they will have the opposite outcome.

Yet, there is a path toward common sense.

In effect, H.J. Res. 95 disapproves “the rule submitted by the Department of Labor … and such rule shall have no force or effect.”

While that may seem harsh, many lawmakers, including Foxx, do agree that “our nation’s overtime rules need to be modernized” and have been prepared to offer counter proposals.

We must craft time to consider these proposals for many vital reasons: in the interest of not limiting opportunities for employees and placing unrecoverable burdens on those who create jobs, in the interest of fully reviewing the impact on our nonprofit organizations and institutions of higher learning and, equally as important, in the interest of transparency and accountability.

While there is still time for action, first things first. Congress should, under the authority of the Congressional Review Act, pass the resolution of disapproval to prevent from taking effect a rule that is more harm than good to our workforce.

http://www.wataugademocrat.com/opinion/our-view-fair-labor-rule-not-so-fair/article_ba897826-75e4-5c66-a4d7-88c5e48c5d05.html