Q. Has the salary threshold increased for exempt status under the Fair Labor Standards Act?
A. On September 24 — more than five years after the Obama administration first proposed updating the overtime regulations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) — the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) released the final version of its long-anticipated rule expanding overtime eligibility for certain employees making less than $35,568 per year. The final rule is largely unchanged from the proposed rule released in March 2019, and the dollar amounts for the exemptions are lower than those in the rule published by the Obama administration in May 2016 — a rule that was enjoined shortly before it was scheduled to go into effect.