Phase 1 of 3 · Legal Hygiene
Exempt / non-exempt
The line that decides whether a salaried worker must still be paid extra past forty hours in a week, or may be paid one flat amount however long the week runs.
Salary is one test. Duties are the other, and the title is neither.
In plain English
Exempt and non-exempt describe whether overtime is owed, and the label is earned by how someone is paid and what they actually do, never by the job title.
- What it looks like in business
- A salaried assistant manager who mostly runs a register stays non-exempt, so hour forty one still costs time and a half.
- Why it matters
- Calling a role exempt to dodge overtime is the classification mistake that produces two years of back pay plus an equal amount again.
Reading it once is not the same as knowing it. Put this term in the daily rotation and let the quiz come back for it.
Study this termWhere this comes from
29 C.F.R. Part 541, the white collar duties tests
This is HR guidance, not legal advice, and rules change. Check the current text and your own facts before you act on it. When a situation needs a lawyer, Jennifer will say so.
Where it sits
Phase 1: Legal Hygiene
Stay legal without becoming a lawyer: the Texas and federal rules that still apply when the owner is the HR department.