Individual Project - Assignment Example

Many states in the US adopt different minimum wage laws and as such some may be lower or higher than that prescribed by the Federal minimum wages. The law states that “when an employee is under both the state and federal minimum wage law, the employee is entitled to receive the higher of the two minimum wages. In this case, Maxim is following the correct guideline of paying the minimum wage of $8.50 per hour. 2. The term exempt employees are categorized under the Fair Labor Standards Act as those receiving salary of not less than $455 per week.

Exempt employees according to job titles, are the executives, administrative, professional, computer and outside sales employees who receive compensation of $455 a week or $100,000 a year(Chamberlain, Kaufman & Jones, n.d.) Under the guidelines of the FLSA, the sales associates of Maxim are classified under the non-exempt category because they are inside sales employees, and they still receive $340 a week only ($8.50 x 40 hrs.). Maxim’s Department Supervisors can be classified as exempt employees because they perform supervision over the sales staff and their wage rate amounts to $14.

25 per hour, equivalent to$570 a week. The FLSA said that a Supervisor is someone who is doing high level work. It is assumed here, that the Department Supervisors of Maxim may perform either one of the following duties prescribed in the FLSA: interviewing, selecting, and training employees; setting rates of pay and hours of work; maintaining production or sales records (beyond the merely clerical); appraising productivity; handling employee grievances or complaints, or disciplining employees; determining work techniques; planning the work; apportioning work among employees; determining the types of equipment to be used in performing work, or materials needed; planning budgets for work; monitoring work for legal or regulatory compliance; providing for safety and security of the workplace. 3. According to the SSS online, the latest cost of living salary adjustment that becomes effective on December 2011 is 3.

6 percent for Social Security benefits and SSI payments. Investopedia defines Costs of Living Adjustment (COLA)” as an adjustment made to social security and supplemental income in order to adjust benefits to counteract inflation”. COLA is usually based on the consumer price index for urban wager earners and wage earners. The average consumer price index as of December 2011 is 3.6 percent (SSS On line) The WEST CPI is 3.4 percent as of October 2011(Bureau of Labor Statistics) Based on this information, computation of the CPI is shown as follows Average consumer price index 3.

6 percent West CPI 3.4 percent Difference 0.2 percent Adjustments in COLA took effect in 1975 and do not remain the same for each year. For 2012, SSS online, calculates the maximum monthly Federal amounts for an eligible individual $698, for an eligible individual with an eligible spouse $ 1,048 and for an essential person $3350 In this context, the Average Consumer price index as computed by the SSI should be followed. 4. The index of job classes in Portland does not provide an exact job title for Sales Associate and Department Supervisor.

(Listing of job classes, 2011) However, similar level of jobs exist in in