Analyzing the Recent Upward Surge in Overtime Hours

Ron L. Hetrick is an economist in the Division of Monthly Industry Employment Statistics, Bureau of Labor Statistics. From March 1991, the end of the last recession, to early 1997, average weekly overtime in manufacturing increased by 1.6 hours, reaching its highest level—4.9 hours—since BLS began publishing the series in 1956. Overtime remained at or near this high level over the next year, retreating slightly by the end of 1998. These data are from the BLS Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey, a monthly survey of payroll, hours, and earnings collected from a sample of more than 400,000 of the Nation’s employers. The CES program defines overtime as hours for which premiums were paid because they exceeded the number of straight-time workday or workweek hours. Average overtime is computed by dividing the total number of overtime hours in a given industry by the number of production workers in that industry, including those that work no overtime at all. Historically, average overtime has increased with recoveries and fallen with recessions, with the level never exceeding 4.1 hours. Average overtime fell from 3.7 to 3.3 hours during the 1990-91 recession, but the current expansion has seen overtime reach an unprecendented level. This article analyzes the striking growth in overtime from March 1991 to January 1998 and its relationship to employment.