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Common Dreams reports
[On November 22, U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant of Texas] halted an Obama administration rule that would have expanded overtime pay for millions of workers, a decision that was slammed by employees' rights advocates.
The U.S. Department of Labor rule, which was set to go into effect on December 1, would have made overtime pay available to full-time salaried employees making up to $47,476 a year. It was expected to touch every nearly every sector [1] in the U.S. economy. The threshold for overtime pay was previously set at $23,660, and had been updated once in 40 years--meaning any full-time employees who earned more than $23,600 were not eligible for time-and-a-half when they worked more than 40 hours a week.
[...] Workers' rights advocates reacted with dismay and outrage. David Levine, CEO and co-founder of the American Sustainable Business Council, mourned the ruling, saying the opponents were "operating from short-sighted, out-moded thinking".
"The employees who will be hurt the most and the economies that will suffer the most are in the American heartland, where wages are already low", Levine said. "When employers pay a fair wage, they benefit from more productive, loyal, and motivated employees. That's good for a business' bottom line and for growing the middle class that our nation's economy depends on. High road businesses understand that better compensation helps build a better work culture."
[...] Christine Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project (NELP), noted [2] that the rule would have impacted up to 12.5 million workers, citing research by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).
"The business trade associations and Republican-led states that filed the litigation in Texas opposing the rules have won today, but will not ultimately prevail in their attempt to take away a long-overdue pay raise for America's workers", she said. "Unfortunately, for the time being, workers will continue to work longer hours for less pay thanks to this obstructionist litigation."
[1][2] Content is behind scripts.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Zz9zZ on Monday November 28 2016, @11:50PM
You have to be careful not to let anecdotes shape your opinions. There will always be examples of shitty human behavior, but don't become jaded unless it really is the vast majority. In this case it sounds like you helped out some pretty "bleh" type people, but I'm sure there are plenty of others who really appreciate the help.
Poverty traps are real, and communities can quickly go downhill when people don't have any hope. I would argue that the welfare mentality is the result of runaway capitalism. Wall street squeezes and cheats every dime they can, these welfare people are simply doing the same with the resources available. Perhaps if minimum wage was actually a livable rate then you'd see people going to work instead of living off welfare. Asking people to work full time and have a harder time paying the bills than if they stayed on welfare is... dumb. Basic risk/reward keeps these people where they are, and the answer is for some type of wealth normalization so that even the poorest people can afford food/shelter/entertainment as well as save some money regularly.
Without some normalization these problems will get worse. The system IS the problem, welfare and such are bandaids to try and keep society moving along but what we really need is serious surgery.
~Tilting at windmills~