Unions pushing to protect OT pay

AFL-CIO president John Sweeney is expected to begin the effort Monday, when the labor federation's members will sponsor a letter-writing campaign to congressional leaders to protest the government's proposed changes in overtime rules. Sweeney is also scheduled to meet with news organizations about labor's concerns. "Next week, the AFL-CIO will launch an overtime pay national week of action, which will mobilize tens of thousand of union activists to speak out for overtime pay and urge their members of Congress to honor their paychecks," Sweeney said. "We will continue to sound the alarm and urge Congress to take responsibility and preserve overtime protection."

Under the government's proposal, approximately 640,000 white-collar workers earning more than $65,000 a year would no longer be guaranteed overtime pay after working more than 40 hours per week.

At the same time, said Tammy McCutchen, administrator of the Labor Department's Wage and Hour Division, 1.3 million employees whose annual income is below $22,100 would receive the benefit of overtime pay for the first time.

Labor groups contend many more US workers would lose overtime pay under the proposed changes. A union-backed study released this year by the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute reported that up to 8 million salaried and hourly workers could lose overtime pay if the plan goes into effect in 2004. McCutchen disagreed.

The Labor Department established the nation's overtime standards under the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, which guarantees nonsupervisory workers the right to overtime pay after they log 40 hours in a work week. The law also gives the Labor Department authority to implement rules to enforce the law.

McCutchen said the new rules would update the law, which does not take into account changing workplaces and the many new jobs that have developed in the last 25 years. The regulations were last revised in 1975.

Labor unions have been lobbying against the proposed revision. The protests seemed to bear fruit in September, when the US Senate approved an amendment sponsored by Senator Thomas Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, to block the new rules from removing overtime eligibility from professional and skilled workers earning more than $65,000 annually. In October, the House voted to instruct members who were merging the two versions of Harkin's amendment to back the measure.

The overtime pay guarantee was an amendment to the 2004 Labor, Health and Human Services and Education spending bill, which was later rolled into an omnibus bill that called for millions of dollars for international AIDS relief, educational aid to poor children, and money for the FBI's fight against terrorism.

Labor's push to advance the Harkin amendment hit a wall this week, however, when the pay protection guarantee was dropped from the final version of the omnibus bill -- after the White House threatened to veto the bill if the amendment remained in place.

Labor leaders responded by demanding that congressional supporters continue their efforts by blocking passage of the omnibus bill until the overtime pay guarantee was reinstated. Instead, the Senate adjourned Wednesday without taking action.

An angry Sweeney said the decision to adjourn was "unconscionable."

Democrats, who have lobbied against the overtime rules changes throughout the year, are expected to continue to do so in December. They contend that one in five US workers now has a workweek that exceeds 50 hours.

Diane E. Lewis can be reached at dlewis@globe.com.