3 Million More U.S. Workers Could Qualify For Overtime

At the end of last month (Aug. 2023), the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) announced a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM ) that would restore and extend overtime protections to 3.6 million salaried workers. The proposed rule would guarantee overtime pay for most salaried workers earning less than $1,059 per week, about $55,000 per year.

In a press release of the announcement, Acting DOL Secretary Julie Su commented, “For over 80 years, a cornerstone of workers’ rights in this country is the right to a 40-hour workweek, the promise that you get to go home after 40 hours or you get higher pay for each extra hour that you spend laboring away from your loved ones. I’ve heard from workers again and again about working long hours, for no extra pay, all while earning low salaries that don’t come anywhere close to compensating them for their sacrifices.”

According to the press release, the proposed rule would do the following:

• Restore and extend overtime protections to low-paid salaried workers. Many low-paid salaried employees work side-by-side with hourly employees, doing the same tasks and often working over 40 hours a week. But because of outdated and out-of-sync rules, these low-paid salaried workers aren’t getting paid time-and-a-half for hours worked over 40 in a week. The department’s proposed salary level would help ensure that more of these low-paid salaried workers receive overtime protections traditionally provided by the department’s rules.

• Give workers who are not exempt executive, administrative, or professional employees valuable time back. By better identifying which employees are executive, administrative, or professional employees who should be overtime exempt, the proposed rule will better ensure that those who are not exempt will gain more time with their families or receive additional compensation when working more than 40 hours a week.

• Prevent future erosion of overtime protections and ensure greater predictability. The rule proposes automatically updating the salary threshold every three years to reflect current earnings data.

• Restore overtime protections for U.S. territories. From 2004 until 2019, the department’s regulations ensured that for U.S. territories where the federal minimum wage was applicable, so too was the overtime salary threshold. The department’s proposed rule would return to that practice and ensure that workers in the U.S. territories subject to the federal minimum wage have the same overtime protections as other U.S. workers.

The Department invites the public to comment on this NPRM. The NPRM’s 60-day comment period closes at 11:59 p.m. ET on November 7, 2023. The Department will consider all comments received before publishing a final rule. Learn more about the proposed rule and instructions for submitting comments.

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