US Senator Proposes Bill To Eliminate Overtime For IT Workers

[DamianTV]

http://it.slashdot.org/story/11/12/02/1350229/us-senator-proposes-bill-to-eliminate-overtime-for-it-workers



"Kay Hagan (D) from North Carolina has introduced a bill (http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s112-1747) to the Senate that would eliminate overtime pay for IT workers (http://www.standalone-sysadmin.com/blog/2011/11/usa-computer-professionals-update-act/)."

The bill is targeted at salaried IT employees and those whose hourly rate is $27.63 or more. It seems comprehensive in its description of what types of IT work qualify — everything from analysis and consulting to design and development to training and testing. The bill even uses "work related to computers" as one of the guidelines.

Im more than certain this will get a few posts about how Government solution to problems is worse than the problem itself...

[dannno]

So wait, do we "need" more people in the IT industry or less? I was under the impression we "needed" more. Not that government should be involved in the solution, but this seems to do the opposite of the intended goal :confused:

[Cowlesy]

I wonder what lobbying group put this little nugget of an idea in her pea-brain.

Corporatism.

[specsaregood]

I wonder what lobbying group put this little nugget of an idea in her pea-brain.

Corporatism.

Shouldn't we be against govt mandated overtime pay? This doesn't prevent employees and employers from working out a private contract dealing with such pay.

[low preference guy]

Shouldn't we be against govt mandated overtime pay? This doesn't prevent employees and employers from working out a private contract dealing with such pay.

From the title I thought they were making overtime pay illegal.

[Cowlesy]

From the title I thought they were making overtime pay illegal.

Right, that's what I thought too.

[Cowlesy]

Shouldn't we be against govt mandated overtime pay? This doesn't prevent employees and employers from working out a private contract dealing with such pay.

I'd agree it should not be mandated, but also not be illegal.

In the end, I guess I shouldn't care because I am not an IT Pro, nor do I employ any. :P

[low preference guy]

Right, that's what I thought too.

If that's not it, I declare whoever wrote the original title retarded.

[anaconda]

Huh? This is just surreal. Wage controls? Are we back in the Nixon Administration? I wonder what it would be like to live in Canada. Maybe quite far north.

[DamianTV]

I wonder at times what it would be like to work for an employer that does not try to completely screw you over, or have a government there that does not intend on screwing you over either?

[specsaregood]

From the title I thought they were making overtime pay illegal.

i don't think so. I think it just makes it unmandated by law.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s112-1747

[fisharmor]

I'm working overtime this very second, on a Friday night, uncompensated, trying to get some sql debugged.
I'm going to use that in a couple weeks to negotiate a raise.
But I'm also not hourly. And I have a good relationship with my employer, largely, I think, for that reason.
There are still companies out there that like to reward good employees. I think they're the ones that have few mandates on how to run their businesses.

[Xenophage]

I'm in IT and I have a little bit of insight here.

People in the IT industry are generally salaried and don't get overtime as it is, but they are expected to work massive amounts of overtime. I can't tell, but I think this might repeal the mandate for overtime for hourly workers, which means many companies may be more likely to move their salaried workers to hourly, which would probably be a very good thing for most IT workers who already put in 60 to 80 hour weeks.

So, here's how it works: Companies need their IT guys to work a lot of hours. They can't afford the mandatory overtime associated with hourly workers, so they pay them salaried instead. If you don't have to work overtime, salary is good, but people in IT generally know salaried positions suck because you're going to be working at 8pm on Saturday night for no extra pay. It'd be a lot nicer to get hourly pay, even if that doesn't include overtime.

I'd say this is a good thing, not a bad thing... unless I'm reading it wrong, of course.

[fisharmor]

So, here's how it works: Companies need their IT guys to work a lot of hours. They can't afford the mandatory overtime associated with hourly workers, so they pay them salaried instead. If you don't have to work overtime, salary is good, but people in IT generally know salaried positions suck because you're going to be working at 8pm on Saturday night for no extra pay. It'd be a lot nicer to get hourly pay, even if that doesn't include overtime.

Yep, that's how it is.
I don't agree with hourly IT work for the same reason I don't agree with hourly roofing work or hourly landscaping.
Right now, the SSRS week-late-total-fucking-abortions I'm dealing with were made by hourly employees - contractors.
They're not going to fix these because it would take me twice as long just to get over the language barrier as it would to just do it.
And the company will end up paying out for it.
It's the same concept for me as paying a crew hourly to put on a roof. Hell no, I'm not doing that - they'd just screw off for half the day.
I'm paying them to get the job done.

I submit that if hourly employees completely disappeared from the IT world, the salaried employees wouldn't have to stay late every day to clean up their messes.

[DamianTV]

From a personal perspective, I agree and think that it would be great, but from a more responsible position, this will cause everyone more problems, more layoffs, more jobs sent overseas.