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At a time when inflation-adjusted wages are falling, President Bush is pushing a plan to take even more money out of workers' pockets.

Bush already changed federal wage and hour regulations that will eliminate eligibility for overtime for millions of American workers, including low and middle class workers. Bush's overtime rule changes are due to take effect Aug. 23, after Congress failed to overturn them before its August recess.

Even before those changes take effect, workers' real earnings are falling. According to an analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data by the non-profit Economic Policy Institute, workers' weekly and hourly wages adjusted for inflation are lower now than they were in November 2001. Earnings have fallen for six of the past seven months.

At campaign stops in the Midwest in early August, Bush again proposed what he called "flextime," which he said would allow employers to substitute time off for overtime pay. The business-backed proposal has been pending in Congress for several years.

According to the AFL-CIO, Bush's "flextime" proposal would allow employers to pay overtime only after employees work 80 hours in a two-week period. That would allow management to work employees 50 or 60 hours in one week and 30 or 20 hours the next, while paying no overtime for the first week.

The AFL-CIO has charged that, while the proposal pretends to allow workers to choose when and if to take comp time instead of overtime, in reality employers will make those choices. The proposal would allow employers to avoid overtime costs for a year, according to labor economists.

Current federal wage and hour laws–established under Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt as part of his "New Deal" legislation–are based on a 40-hour workweek. Hours worked beyond that are supposed to be paid at time-and-a-half.

The overtime regulation put through by the Bush administration leaves the 40-hour workweek and time-and-a-half rule intact but changes definitions of who is eligible for overtime and the minimum and maximum wage levels set by law.

Bush's "flex-time" proposal is aimed at eliminating the 40-hour workweek. AFL-CIO Pres. John J. Sweeney said that, despite the "family friendly garb" that a flexible work schedule presents, the proposal "is really about giving America's corporations the flexibility to cheat their workers out of overtime pay after 40 hours a week."

Noting that current law already allows employers to create flexible schedules for employees, Sweeney said that any "banking of comp time would essentially be an interest-free loan from workers to employers as employers compensate workers with time off rather than cash–often weeks later. Comp time is 'paid leave' only in the sense that it is 'paid for' by the worker's own lost overtime earnings, minus interest."

"The Bush proposal takes away corporations' one big disincentive against having their employees work excessive hours–a time-and-a-half cash premium. Many workers will feel pressure from their employers to work more than 40 hours a week without overtime pay, and then take time off in the coming weeks in order to accommodate the employer's schedule–not their own," Sweeney said. "The upshot of the Bush proposal is that working Americans will have less time with their families–not more."