The 40-hour work week? Check.
A federal minimum wage? Yup.
Ensuring our kids aren’t slaving away in dangerous factories? That, too.
Standards that working Americans have come to expect — and that have given millions a chance at better wages and working conditions — can be traced back to historic legislation enacted 78 years ago this month: The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).
It is fitting that we mark the anniversary of the FLSA — few laws have done more to help establish a floor for working standards in America. And recent updates by the Obama Administration to extend the Act’s overtime protections to four million workers who were denied coverage because of outdated regulations are historic in their own right, and a cause for celebration.
But this anniversary also marks another year that motorcoach drivers are exempt from overtime protections thanks to an indefensible — and in this case, unsafe — loophole in the law.
Unlike 85 percent of the American workforce, intercity bus drivers are exempt from provisions in the FLSA, meaning they aren’t guaranteed time-and-a-half pay when they work more than 40 hours in a single week.
Read more in The Huffington Post.