White-Collar Workers Seek Overtime, Too

By Jennifer Hopfinger
October 3, 2007 08:43 PM

“Does your boss owe you overtime?” asks BusinessWeek’s Oct. 1 cover story, “Wage Wars,” by Michael Orey. According to the article, the whole notion of who deserves overtime pay is changing--and companies are losing huge lawsuits to unlikely groups of workers.

Wage-and-hour lawsuits on behalf of traditional working class positions, such as truckers, construction laborers, and restaurant workers, have long been the norm, but attorneys are increasingly filing suits for many traditional white-collar workers, such as stockbrokers, accountants, and pharmaceutical sales reps, who earn high salaries but clock incredibly long hours. For example, according to the story, the average drug sales rep earns an average of $79,000 a year and works an average of 65 hours a week--essentially working close to two jobs in order to earn a middle-class income.

About 86% of the U.S. workers are covered by federal overtime rules, according to the U.S. Labor Department. The rules apply to both salaried and hourly workers alike. Wage-and-hour lawsuits have more than doubled in federal courts since 2001, but many white-collar workers still don’t question the status quo. “So deeply rooted are archaic workplace stereotypes that many college-educated, white-collar workers are resistant to the idea that they are entitled to overtime. They associate it with a labor pool that is valued for brawn rather than brains. The notion of keeping track of their hours so they can get paid for long weeks strikes them as déclassé,” Orey writes.

However, that attitude is starting to change. “In overtime cases, Depression-era laws aimed at factories and textile mills are being applied in a 21st century economy, raising fundamental questions about the rules of the modern workplace. As the country has shifted from manufacturing to services, for example, which employees deserve the protections these laws offer?” Orey writes. “Generally, workers with jobs that require independent judgment have not been entitled to overtime pay. But with businesses embracing efficiency and quality-control initiatives, more and more tasks, even in offices, are becoming standardized, tightly choreographed routines.”

Technology has also blurred the lines of the workday, forcing many employees to be available during off-hours. Nobody works bankers’ hours anymore--not even bankers--but according to the article, they’re increasingly getting paid extra for it.

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Copyright © 2008 Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism