[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 5185-5186]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        FAIR LABOR STANDARDS ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, this year, job creators should expect 
significant changes to Federal wage and hour laws, throwing yet one 
more hurdle in front of them and their employees as the U.S. Department 
of Labor, the DOL, finalizes new overtime regulations under the Fair 
Labor Standards Act, or the FLSA.
  The basic premise of the FLSA, which applies to many Pennsylvania 
employers, is that if you are receiving a salary, it must be because 
your employer is cheating you. The rule that has the force of law 
discourages salaried employees and discourages the give-and-take 
between employee and employer to work for the best interest of each 
one.
  There are limited exceptions to the FLSA's overtime obligations for 
narrow categories of employees and for those in particular industries 
and occupations. The most common exemptions are for white-collar 
employees like executive, administrative, and professional employees.

                              {time}  1030

  Currently, an employee must satisfy three criteria to qualify as 
exempt from Federal overtime pay: first, you must make a salary; 
second, your salary must be more than $455 per week, or $23,660 
annually; and third, your primary duties must be consistent with 
managerial, professional, or administrative positions as defined by the 
Department of Labor. They don't know every single job in every 
community across the country, but yet they are the ones that decide, 
not the people actually doing the work or the ones who started and own 
the business.
  Last year, the DOL proposed arbitrarily increasing the salary 
threshold to $50,440 per year, a 113 percent increase, just arbitrarily 
said that is the way it is going to be. It also proposed automatically 
increasing the salary threshold on an annual basis regardless of what 
the economy is. If the economy grew at 4 percent, I guess it would be 
one thing. If it didn't grow or it grew at 0.3 percent, which is what 
GDP is currently, it would still go up--again, just arbitrary. This 
doesn't come from Congress. This isn't bandied back and forth between 
the Democrats and the Republicans, between the House and the Senate. 
This is just bureaucrats making a rule, the force of law.
  These proposed rules will bring sweeping changes to Federal wage and 
hour laws, and they will be especially burdensome on rural areas, like 
central Pennsylvania. They will also significantly impact local 
governments, nonprofit organizations, and small retailers, among many 
others.
  Because of this rule, for instance, a dry cleaner that I met with 
recently simply is going to have to make a choice. They are either 
going to hire fewer people or raise prices for their customers.
  I recently met with county commissioners in the district I am 
privileged to represent. If the requirement is raised, as DOL proposes, 
50 county employees will be affected, which will result in either fewer 
employees or nearly $400,000 in expenses for the county moving forward. 
How do you think they are going to offset those costs if they don't 
lose those employees or fire those employees? You guessed it. You and I 
are going to pay--the local taxpayers.
  I also met with the YWCA in my district, a nonprofit organization. 
They looked at the potential impact of these regulations and determined 
that approximately 30 staff members would be affected, resulting in 
either a loss of jobs or an additional expense of over $200,000. For a 
nonprofit that is struggling to get by, struggling to provide 
services--whether it is a daycare for underprivileged folks--or just to 
keep the doors open, they are going to have to make a choice, all 
because of a rule that didn't come from here. It came from the 
regulators, as usual, who aren't interested in the input of the 
Nation's citizens in all too many cases. This is just another example 
of bureaucrats of the administrative state--in this case, the 
Department of Labor--developing top-down regulations that crush 
organizations like nonprofits, small businesses, and communities that 
can least afford it.
  For this reason, I am happy to support a solution. We shouldn't have 
to provide this solution because this is really a problem that doesn't 
exist. But

[[Page 5186]]

there is a solution, the Protecting Workplace Advancement and 
Opportunity Act, introduced by my colleague from Michigan, Mr. Tim 
Walberg, which prevents the DOL from implementing this misguided and 
completely unnecessary proposal and rule. I strongly urge other Members 
to support this important legislation as well.

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