Overtime and FLSA

Federal overtime law is short, and most of the confusion comes from three questions: when the hours are counted, who is covered, and how the extra pay is priced. Each article in this category takes one of those questions and answers it with the rule from the Department of Labor, the regulation behind it, and a worked pay example computed by the same engines as the calculators on this site.

Start with the question you have. If you want to know whether a salary rules out overtime, read “Do salaried employees get overtime?”, which sets out the three exemption tests, the salary level in the Department of Labor’s fact sheet, and the overtime owed on one weekly salary under two methods. If your question is whether the day or the week starts the count, read “Overtime: 8 hours a day or 40 a week?”, which prices the same week under the federal rule and under the states that add daily overtime. If you work in a hospital or care setting, read “8 and 80 vs. 12-hour shifts for nurses”, which compares the pay for five common schedules.

Every article names the pages it relied on, the date they were opened and the date it is due for another check. The figures are examples, not advice for your job: whether overtime is owed depends on your state, on how the job is classified and on what the employer has agreed to pay. Each article links to the calculator that works out your own numbers, and none of them needs an account.