I protest.

They're at it again.

This time the Republicans in the House want to do away with overtime pay: Workday Minnesota: House votes Thursday on bill to take away overtime pay. Bearing in mind that in my chosen profession I don't receive overtime pay, I think that this is an incredibly bad idea. For one thing, the bill, HR 1119, "allows employers to veto employees' decisions about when to use their time off." For another, it removes the longstanding financial incentive for a forty-hour workweek. Worse, it allows employers to withhold overtime pay for up to thirteen months. This pay is not put into any kind of trust fund or escrow account and so would be lost entirely if the company were to fold in that time. The article "The Naked Truth About Comp Time" has many more details of this nasty piece of legislation.

The bill was introduced by Representative Judy Biggert of Illinois and is cosponsored by such notables as Katherine Harris of Florida (yes, that Katherine Harris) and Howard Coble of North Carolina. This is a fairly typical piece of screw-the-poor Republican legislation and deserves to be soundly defeated.

Time to write my representative (Jane Harman, in my case). You should, too.

For a copy of my letter to Ms. Harman (which you may use as a template, although please modify it before you send it), read further:

Rep. Jane Harman
Room 229 CHOB- Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515-0536

Dear Ms. Harman,

As your constituent, I am writing today to urge you to oppose House Resolution 1119, the so-called "Family Time Flexibility Act." Although I, myself, will not be directly affected by this Act, being a software engineer who is exempt from the rules governing hourly workers, I find this piece of legislation repugnant in the extreme. It will deny such workers the right to use their time off as they see fit or to be paid more for working more. Further, it reduces pay to such workers and even allows employers to delay paying for overtime by up to thirteen months!

This legislation places much too much power over hourly workers into the hands of their employers. These workers need more power, not less. The Fair Labor Standards Act has worked well for some 65 years and while it may need some fine-tuning, it should be to give these relatively powerless workers more rights, not fewer. Instead, this legislation is an attempt to roll back those rights to a time most of us have never known, a time when the worker was at the mercy of his employer.

Again, I strongly urge you to oppose this legislation. In fact, Ms. Harman, I feel confident that you will do so and have been happy with your voting record so far. I look forward to seeing your vote against this bill.

Thank you.