GOP Hopes Comp-Time Plan Works With Voters

When Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, fewer than one out of five mothers worked for pay outside the home and a nation reeling from the Great Depression was more concerned that employers would seek to avoid paying workers overtime than that workers would be begging for more time off.

But times have changed. And a group of Republican lawmakers is saying that the law should change too. Proclaiming themselves champions of working women and their families, female GOP lawmakers this week unveiled the “Working Families Flexibility Act,” which would give employers the option of offering their workers paid compensatory, or “comp,” time for their overtime work in lieu of overtime pay.

Led by Rep. Sue Myrick (R-N.C.), the female lawmakers touted their bill as one in a series of GOP pro-family, pro-women initiatives. And they challenged the Clinton administration and congressional Democrats, who in the past have opposed changes in comp-time policy, to “put family-friendly legislation in writing rather than rhetoric.”

To the Democrats, who consider themselves the true champions of working women and their families, those are fighting words. At a news conference announcing the proposal Thursday, the GOP freshmen sought to steal Democrats’ “family-friendly” message. But Democrats were preparing proposals of their own aimed at the hearts, minds and votes of the American family, including expanding a law requiring employers to grant workers leave when children are born or family members are ill.

The dueling initiatives are no coincidence. They represent the latest round in each party’s ongoing efforts to win the loyalty of female voters. Recent polls have shown Clinton well ahead of Republican challenger Bob Dole when voters are asked which presidential candidate “understands the problems of the average American family.” And among working women, Clinton enjoys a commanding lead.

Republicans argued that their comp-time initiative responds to the demands of working families--and especially working mothers--for greater flexibility, as well as to the wishes of employers who want to give it to them. In two recent surveys conducted by Republican pollsters, as many as seven out of 10 parents said they wanted to be able to choose between overtime pay and paid time off to spend with their families.

Today 70% of mothers with children younger than 18 are in the paid work force--and they are being required to work longer hours. In the American manufacturing sector, for example, the amount of overtime hours logged by employees has been creeping up steadily since the late 1950s, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking such figures. In 1993 the average amount of overtime worked by each manufacturing employee exceeded four hours a week for the first time. In 1994 the overtime average increased to a high of 4.7 hours a week.

But Democrats dismiss the GOP comp-time proposal as little more than an effort to cast the Republicans as family friendly.

“This is a fig leaf for the people who voted against the Family and Medical Leave Act,” said Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.), referring to the 1993 law that allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for newborns or sick family members. “They had no idea how popular it was going to become with the public,” she said.

Schroeder and Clinton administration officials faulted the proposed Working Families Flexibility Act for giving employers too much control in making the time-or-pay decision. And if employers get to determine when it is convenient for an employee to take compensatory time, they argue, then the legislation serves employers more than families.

The bill’s backers contend that the proposal has strict provisions that would protect employees from coercion. A worker and employer must agree on when compensatory time will be taken instead of overtime pay, they said. But one administration official said the provisions have loopholes that “you could drive a truck through.”

Democrats in the White House and Congress are countering the Republican proposal with initiatives of their own, which they believe will establish the Democrats as the real champions of working women and families.

On Friday, for instance, Schroeder and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) introduced legislation that would expand the number of workers covered by the Family and Medical Leave Act. Currently, companies with fewer than 50 employees are exempt from the requirement to guarantee that a worker’s job will still be there when he or she returns after attending to family needs. The Dodd-Schroeder bill would lower that threshold to 25 employees.

The Clinton administration, meanwhile, is preparing a “family reunion” in Nashville on Monday. There, President Clinton is expected to unveil a number of new initiatives designed to help families juggle their responsibilities at work and home. Among the expected steps: an executive order that would guarantee government employees as many as 24 hours of unpaid leave per year to attend their children’s school functions.

On Capitol Hill, Dodd and Schroeder are pressing to make such “educational leave” guarantees available to all workers.

“With families barely keeping afloat, we need to take action now to allow parents to participate in their children’s social and academic lives without fear of losing their jobs,” Dodd said.

“The bidding war has begun,” one House Democratic aide said of the competing proposals. “Let the games begin.”