Bush Policies Hurting Workers - a history

Bush Policies Hurting Workers -The Face of Today’s Economy

More than 2.7 million private-sector jobs have been lost since President Bush took office in January 2001, and millions more workers are concerned about their deteriorating pensions, health benefits and ability to make ends meet.

The Bush administration’s response has been a slap in the face to U.S. workers: In February 2003, Bush proposed a fiscal year 2004 budget with a $951 billion tax cut package over the next decade that will primarily benefit millionaires, push the federal budget to a record deficit in fiscal year 2004 and destroy 750,000 more jobs over the next 10 years, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Instead of spending $951 billion on millionaire tax cuts, the Bush administration could:

• Repair the nation’s schools.
• Fund a meaningful Medicare drug benefit.
• Provide all workers with a substantial tax cut Bush Proposal Could End Overtime Pay for Millions of Workers

The Bush administration proposed new rules March 27 that would erode the 40-hour workweek and could deny overtime pay protections to millions of workers. The proposed changes to Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) regulations would affect a wide range of the more than 80 million workers protected by the FLSA. FLSA’s current overtime rules protect workers from employers who do not now require workers to work unreasonably long hours because they are required to pay overtime. The Bush rules could mean that many workers would face unpredictable work schedules because of an increased demand for extra hours for which employers would not have to pay time-and-half. The Bush administration claims its proposal to raise the income ceiling for workers to automatically qualify for overtime pay would extend protection to some lower-income workers currently excluded. But most of these workers already are covered by overtime protections because of the nature of their jobs. In contrast, the Bush administration’s proposed changes in workers’ job definitions and duties that must be met to allow an employer to classify workers as “exempt” and thus ineligible for overtime would affect many more hundreds of thousands of workers.

Many working families depend on overtime pay to balance their checkbooks and pay bills—especially during the current economic recession that has resulted in stagnant and declining wages, increasing costs of health care, prescription drugs, child care, gasoline and other everyday expenses. The Bush proposal would cut into many of those families’ paychecks.

The Bush overtime proposal:
• Excludes previously protected workers by reclassifying them as managers, administrative or professional employees who are not eligible for overtime pay.
• Eliminates certain middle-income workers from overtime protections by adding an income limit, above which workers no longer qualify for overtime.
• Removes from overtime protection large numbers of workers in aerospace, defense, health care, high tech and other industries.

Courtesy of the AFL-CIO