Judd Gregg: “I rise to speak on the Harkin amendment, which was pending. The issue of overtime has been discussed at great length in…”

“I rise to speak on the Harkin amendment, which was pending. The issue of overtime has been discussed at great length in the last few days. The Harkin amendment, as it comes forward, is an attempt to address what the Senator from Iowa sees as a continuing problem with the regulations as proposed by the Department of Labor. The rules and regulations we are dealing with are over 50 years old and have evolved through a lot of litigation, court decisions, and regulatory activity into what is a fairly Byzantine and complex set of regulations relative to who does and does not get overtime in our society. Under today's law, if you make $8,000, you are guaranteed overtime. Once you get over $8,000, you do not know what will happen. It depends on how your job is classified. There is a lot of arcane classification which comes from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. For example, still in the law we have things such as straw man and a variety of different titles which have no relationship to reality in the marketplace as it is today and the workplace as it is today. We need to update the regulations.”