This article was requested by the Society of Toxicology Postdoctoral Assembly (SOT PDA) Executive Board in honor of National Postdoc Appreciation Week. The author Katherine A. Duggan, M.Ed. is the Postdoctoral Program and Data Coordinator in the Division of Biology and Medicine at Brown University’s Office of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies.
An update to a decades-old federal law governing overtime pay for US workers has caused a big stir in the postdoctoral community. Although the initial notice that the law might be changing came from President Obama as early as 2014, the impact to postdocs really was felt on May 18, 2016, when the US Department of Labor issued its final revisions of the law governing minimum wage and overtime pay for employees, known as the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). As it currently stands, all workers in the US are eligible for overtime pay unless they are exempted because they are paid fixed salaries, have certain defined high-level job responsibilities, and are paid at least $23,660 per year ($455 per week), or because they work in a few strictly defined fields. Those holding postdoctoral positions have traditionally fallen into the exempt category and thus have not been eligible for overtime pay. However, under the new rule released in May, the monetary threshold will increase to $47,476 per year ($913 per week) effective December 1, 2016. So for the many postdocs across the country who make less than this amount, on December 1 something will have to change.
In order to comply with the new FLSA guidelines, US institutions face a choice: raise postdoc salaries to $47,476 or greater and maintain exemption from having to pay overtime, or leave postdoc salaries as they are and convert postdocs earning less than $47,476 to hourly employees, who will need to track their time worked and will be eligible for overtime pay. There is no one right answer, but from a logistical standpoint, many institutions are likely to raise postdoc salaries to avoid the hassle of tracking hours worked and the unpredictability of overtime pay. The National Institutes of Health has amended their postdoctoral pay scale to comply with the law, with a new entry-level postdoc stipend of $47,484 effective December 1, and other institutions (universities, private companies, etc.) are making their own plans to comply as well.
The effects of this rule change on postdocs depends on how an individual’s institution decides to handle compliance with the law. For many, it will mean an increase in salary; for some, it may mean a new weekly task of logging in hours worked. It also is possible that postdocs may be let go or not retained at the end of their contracts, or that some postdoc positions may be eliminated in the future, if the mentors/PIs hiring for them cannot meet the new salary level. While the long-term effects on the postdoctoral population will have to play out over the next few years, it’s important to remember that the motivation behind this change in the law is not to punish anyone—it is meant to provide fairer compensation for the skilled work of postdocs. In this way, the changes to the FLSA are very much in spirit with National Postdoc Appreciation Week and its goal of “recognizing the significant contributions that postdoctoral scholars make to US research and discovery.”
Further Reading
From the US Department of Labor: Final Rule to Update the Regulations Defining and Delimiting the Exemption for Executive, Administrative, and Professional Employees
From The Huffington Post: Fair Pay for Postdocs: Why We Support New Federal Overtime Rules
From the National Institutes of Health: Projected FY 2017 Stipend Levels for Postdoctoral Trainees and Fellows on Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Awards (NRSA)