My dad's company will STILL be offering overtime pay regardless of whether this legislation goes anywhere. So I'm quite confident he will still be able to put food on the table and be able to keep sending my little brother to private school. Rex, you are just convinced that all business owners will screw, screw, SCREW the little guy. You don't give them much credit do you? I can tell you this, the economy has more options than you think. A company that offers generous overtime pay and plenty of hours to work will be a lot more competitive for workers than one that does not. A small business that has it's hand freed by this to save a little money on labor in the short run might be able to put that money toward expanding their operations in the future and hiring more workers, thus growing the economy and jobs. Also, there will be no working of 60 hours a week until a worker "drops dead" for no money. In the industrial workplace, OSHA safety rules still apply. If a worker goes more than 16 hours straight, they MUST stand down and be sent home for at least 12 hours. Now me personally, this isn't exactly the way I would have gone about lightening the small business burden. I am a big advocate of repealing the minimum wage, which would help teenagers and entry level people be more readily hired and solve a lot of our immigration problems by discouraging under-the-table cash only hiring of cheap Mexican labor. Farm and landscaping labor would once again become the domain of kids working the summer and after-school job. And please, spare me the "living wage" arguments; again, the vast majority of people affected by this would be high school and college kids looking to earn some spending money. You cannot support a family on $5.15 an hour; thus, nobody is. All the same, I doubt the sky will fall and all the progress of fair labor laws will be completely rolled back by this legislation. But hey, if abuses do happen, and the economy worsens, let's repeal it. It would've been tried and failed. Small business owners are NOT ogres looking to abuse and enslave their workers. Give them a chance, and give them just a little bit of help in reducing their costs, and they are willing to do their best to help America grow and to help everybody who wants to have a good job get one.
