President Barack Obama's call for expanding the number of employees who qualify for overtime will hurt small businesses, driving many completely out of business, former Reagan administration economist Art Laffer told Fox News Channel's
"Your World with Neil Cavuto" on Tuesday.
"There's just no amount of mischief they can't think of doing," Laffer said of Obama's administration. "I think these people should just take a long vacation until the Republican president takes over. It's just amazing that they just keep going after it every time another new little awful policy."
Obama on Tuesday
announced his plan to raise the point at which overtime is required to $970 a week, or $50,440 a year, even for employees classified as a manager or professional. The current level, instituted in the 1970s, is $455 a week, or $23,600 a year.
Obama says the plan will boost middle-class salaries, but critics such as Laffer say it will force businesses to cut their employees' hours or hire part-timers.
"These guys are trying to make a business, make it grow," Laffer said. "It's really a huge burden on these companies that are trying to make it. And they won't make it."
Jamie Richardson, vice president of fast-food chain White Castle, told Cavuto that if the rule is implemented in 2016 as planned, "We'd have to make some tough decisions."
The family-owned White Castle offers a good retirement plan and other benefits that might have to be cut, he said.
"This would cost us $8 million to $12 million a year if we didn't make any adjustments," Richardson said. And since their customers are struggling, too, "we can't just pass it along," he said.
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