Labor day

Published on Wednesday, August 27, 2003 by ReclaimDemocracy.org

Americans Working More, Earning Less
by Darrell Hutchins and Jeff Milchen

 On Monday many of us will hear standard Labor Day fare--politicians
praising hard-working Americans and their role in creating our
prosperity. But few of them will discuss just how hard and long we
actually work or how little we are rewarded compared to our peers in
other wealthy nations.
Days later, the U.S. Senate could vote on a Department of Labor (DOL)
proposal that would lead to even longer work-weeks by changing federal
rules that determine conditions under which employees must be paid for
overtime work. The rule changes were approved by the House on a 213-210
vote in July, so it now lies with the Senate to prevent the erosion of
overtime protections that were implemented in the 1938 Fair Labor
Standards Act, part of Roosevelt's New Deal.

If the proposed changes are approved, private employers would gain new
power to reclassify millions of workers as salaried employees who
possess no legal limits to their work weeks and no entitlement to
overtime pay. Presently, most hourly-wage earners must be paid 1 ½
times their normal wage for each hour beyond 40 worked in a single week.

The proposal does include at least one positive change. Presently, only
those workers making less than $250 per week must be paid overtime after
40 hours. The DOL proposal sensibly raises that pay level to $425
($22,100 annually). The DOL claims this update would enable 1.3 million
more workers to receive overtime pay, but even if their assumptions were
true, the changes may remove as many or more employees from overtime
coverage as it protects. Estimates range from 640,000 to 8 million.

All workers with annual earnings of $65,000 or more would become
ineligible for mandatory overtime pay unless protected by a union
contract. Additionally, the proposed rules greatly expand the
definitions of managerial and professional employees. Employers could
deprive millions of people earning between $22,100 and $65,000 per year
of overtime pay simply by renaming their positions as "managers" or
other salaried titles.

The pro-worker Economic Policy Institute estimates that 2.5 million
salaried personnel and 5.5 million hourly workers, in just 78
occupational groups studied, would lose their legal right to overtime
pay if Congress approves the proposed changes.

This DOL move would accelerate the trend of Americans working more hours
at lower real (inflation- adjusted) wages over the last 30 years. The
real wages of U.S. workers rose steadily following World War II, but
have declined by more than 13% since peaking in 1973.

The plight of U.S. workers is partly due to U.S. labor protection laws
that are much weaker than those of other industrialized countries. For
example, the U.S. is the only major developed country that does not
ensure a minimum number of paid vacation days. As result, American
workers receive the fewest days of annual paid leave of any wealthy
nation.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that, even after three years at a
job, Americans average just 10.2 annual vacation days. Meanwhile, our
peers abroad typically enjoy 4-6 weeks of paid leave—even those
employed by the same transnational corporations as U.S. workers.

In 2000, 20 million U.S. workers did not get a single day of paid
vacation. Today we work, on average, a month longer each year than 20
years ago, and work more hours per year than our peers in any
industrialized nation. During the last 30 years, work-weeks have become
shorter and the number of days of paid leave has increased everywhere in
the industrialized world, except in the U.S.

Our poor position is remarkable since the U.S. ranks near the top of the
list of developed nations in worker productivity. U.S. laborers have
increased their output per hour by 30% since 1973. Our average hourly
wage in 1998 was $12.77 instead of the $18.40 we would have received
simply by sharing in the benefits of our increased productivity.

Sharing the benefits of increased productivity could have freed us to
work 3 ½ day weeks or five-hour days without losing income, allowing
us time to lead richer social and family lives and giving many of us
enough time away from work to actually enjoy our time on the job.
Instead we're living less and working more. Why?
Unless the Senate gives more than lip service to all of us who earn a
paycheck from private employers, millions of Americans soon will work
still more hours with no additional compensation. Let's demand better of
those who espouse the virtue of American workers this Labor Day, while
organizing toward working less and living more.


Darrell Hutchins ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) and Jeff Milchen are a volunteer
and director, respectively with ReclaimDemocracy.org, a non-profit
organization devoted to restoring citizen authority over corporations.

 from http://www.commondreams.org/

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I posted this because I believe that this is a real concern for many
people including me. We work hard and barely manage to pay our bills and
have any kind of life.

In the Divine Order of things, maybe the financial struggle can help us
see better ways of doing things, and help us see what really matters.
But I will say that I feel WE the common people deserve better than we
have gotten from this society. The people who do the everyday real work
should be able to at least support themselves.

Peace,

Bryan

http://community.webtv.net/RBNaumann/Iam