FLSA Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

FLSA - Essay Example Job titles and clear documents that describe role expectations are developed for this purpose in an effort to link job role with a salary structure. Caribou Coffee had classified workers as exempt and therefore received a salary. As part of their obligations, serving coffee and waiting on customers filled their responsibility list daily. Because of the language and/or the interpretation of the FLSA mandates, Caribou agreed to settle. The employees filing the suit argued successfully that because of their job duties, they were actually non-exempt workers (eliinc.com 2010). It would be difficult to over-complicate the FLSA by providing new amended subsections, especially if the nature of what constitutes exempt versus non-exempt were clearly defined through precedent. For example, if it included specific job role functions, the document would be unreadable and certainly irrelevant. Another case involving exempt versus non-exempt status involved Patty Lee Smith v. Johnson and Johnson in the District Court of New Jersey. The Court ultimately found in favor of J&J, believing evidence of her non-exempt status was insufficient to find otherwise (ca3.uscourts.gov, 2009). Smith worked unsupervised for 95 percent of her role, thus with considerable flexibility on the nature by which she coordinated her responsibilities. Further, no definite job role and list of obligations were present in the human resources division, thus Smith could not prove otherwise considering the evidence of her status that are most closely associated with a person in a salaried, executive level role. It was a common sense ruling, however the language of the FLSA is open to even judicial interpretation due to the lack of practicality in constructing supplements. These situations can be avoided in the future by fully categorizing the job title and the specific responsibilities, or ensuring that a sign off