Overtime Pay: How Much Is Too Much?

Overtime pay for workers at the University of California jumped by more than 12 percent last year, to about $135-million in 2007, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

Much of the overtime earnings went to nurses, which is hardly surprising given the shortage of nurses at many university medical centers. “Three nurses in the University of California system earned more than $90,000 in overtime last year,” the reporter, Tanya Shevitz, writes. Of the three, “Rashpal ‘Paula’ Chela, staff nurse leader in the UC Irvine Regional Burn Center, was the top overtime earner, with $95,570 for extra work, bringing her total earnings in calendar year 2007 to $198,078,” Shevitz adds.

A related article in the Daily Californian, UC-Berkeley’s student newspaper, notes that some employees view the jump in overtime pay as a sign that the university is relying too heavily on too few workers. One such critic, Lakesha Harrison, a licensed vocational nurse at the Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center and Orthopaedic Hospital and president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, told the newspaper that the uptick in overtime was a result of high turnover and subpar salaries: “It’s not a good thing to see people working that much overtime. I wonder when these people have time to take care of themselves.”

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