Politech mailing list archives
FC: Hourly workers may get fewer stock options, from Washington Times
From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 08:39:03 -0500
http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/comment2-02252000.htm February 25, 2000 Out of stock for hourly workers? Richard Miniter The surging stock market has turned stock-option-owning secretaries at Microsoft and truck drivers at UPS into millionaires. Hoping to follow in their footsteps, thousands of hourly workers everyone from machinists to nurses are accepting stock options. Now the U.S. government wants to force them off the gravy train a bureaucratic move that could have huge consequences for economic growth. The U.S. Labor Department recently issued a controversial advisory opinion that would make it harder for companies to offer stock options to hourly employees though corporations would still be able to issue huge stock options to executives and managers. ... Labor Department bureaucrats think the new rule will mean large raises for hourly workers. They're wrong. For employers currently offering stock options, the higher cost of overtime will lead many of them to cut back on the use of hourly workers in effect, shrinking their employees' pay. For start-ups and other businesses that are considering offering options to their hourly workers, the new federal rules will make it more complicated (estimating the net present value of stock options of not yet public companies can be very difficult) and more costly (who wants to pay $15 an hour overtime instead of $9?). That means new businesses probably won't offer options to the guys on the shop floor leaving them out of the greatest bull market in American history. Some benefit. ... Richard Miniter is a visiting fellow at the Lexington Institute. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology To subscribe: send a message to majordomo () vorlon mit edu with this text: subscribe politech More information is at http://www.well.com/~declan/politech/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current thread:
- FC: Hourly workers may get fewer stock options, from Washington Times Declan McCullagh (Feb 29)