In 2004, there was a large fight over overtime rules. Workers who were considered management were exempt from coverage.
The Bush administration expanded that exemption to include many jobs that were not remotely managerial in nature, such as truckers and nurses. This was the first revision of the law in 50 years.
Reich, who is advising the John Kerry presidential campaign, said the rules redefine the term "executive" to include manual workers who sometimes supervise two or three people. He also says another 1 or 2 million "team leaders" who don’t supervise anyone will lose overtime eligibility by being reclassified as "administrators."
This was never the intent of the law and we should work to change it. I have not been able to find many mentions of this on most people's radar.
Understandably, there are a lot of Bush-era mistakes to fix. But this is one way to tilt the balance in favor of workers, and allowing them to have more money in their hand can also help spur economic growth.
Try to write to your Senator and Representatives especially if there are on the labor committees.
http://edlabor.house.gov/...
http://help.senate.gov/...
As always,
I have been a dkos reader for many years (since the pre-scoop days, y'all!) but I have not written many diaries because I am pretty sensitive to criticism. So you will have to forgive me if I don't respond to comments.