Gov. Phil Murphy should revise outdated rules governing overtime pay for salaried workers to guarantee overtime benefits to those earning up to $78,000 by the time the state’s minimum wage hits $15 an hour in 2024, a report released Thursday says.

Such a move could make nearly 300,000 more New Jersey workers eligible for overtime, New Jersey Policy Perspective said in its latest report.

Under existing rules, some workers earning more than $23,660 a year are exempt from receiving overtime. And a change to the federal limit taking effect next year, which would extend overtime benefits to workers earning up to $35,568, doesn’t go far enough, the report says.

While most workers paid hourly are legally entitled to overtime, the rules for salaried employees depend on their annual pay, duties and job classification.

“Hundreds of thousands of modestly paid New Jerseyans are not covered by overtime and are at risk of being exploited by their employer,” said Nicole Rodriguez, the report’s author.

President Donald Trump’s administration announced its own update to federal overtime rules for salaried employees who work more than 40 hours a week. But states can adopt more generous standards.

Policy Perspective, a progressive Trenton think tank that has the governor’s ear, said it is calling on Murphy to raise the salary level to bring overtime protections in New Jersey to 2.5-times the state minimum wage, which is currently $10 an hour but is set to reach $15 an hour in 2024.

In a statement, Murphy spokeswoman Christine Lee said Murphy has directed the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development to "assess and provide guidelines on how we can best ensure that our workers have these safeguards.”

Murphy can change these rules administratively without legislative approval.

“The governor recognizes that workers need overtime protections to be treated fairly in today’s economy," Lee said.

Policy Perspective’s report found that under existing rules, fewer than 7 percent of white-collar, salaried workers are entitled to receive overtime, far less than the nearly 63 percent that were guaranteed overtime in 1975, because the salary threshold has not kept up with the rising cost of living.

At the current minimum wage, workers earning up to $52,000 a year — or 2.5 times $10 an hour — should be receiving overtime pay. Once the minimum wage reaches $15 an hour, 315,000 workers earning up to $78,600 would be newly covered by overtime rules.

That’s 287,000 more workers earning overtime than under the new federal guidelines, according to the report.

But Tom Bracken, president of the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce, said that while businesses have no choice but to abide by the new federal rules, they can’t afford even more costly mandates from the state.

“The federal law is going to kick in. We have to accept that,” he said. “But for New Jersey to supersize that ... we just can’t keep doing this. Enough is enough.”

He predicted business owners would have to shed employees to keep up with rising labor costs, ultimately harming the economy.

“Some people, if this were to be passed, would benefit. But some people aren’t going to have jobs,” he said.

Samantha Marcus may be reached at smarcus@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @samanthamarcus.

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