Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Loyola of Los Angeles Entertainment Law Journal
Publication Date
1996
Volume
16
First Page
277
Abstract
(Excerpt)
This Article examines the question of whether journalists in the print or electronic media are professionals and hence exempt from coverage under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 ("FLSA") or whether they are wage earners and therefore covered by the FLSA. Department of Labor regulations are unclear as to the status of journalists under the FLSA; they recognize that journalists may qualify as professionals but appear to state that most journalists are covered by the FLSA. Those regulations, however, are seriously outdated and out of touch with the modem world of journalism. Promulgated when television was in its infancy and before the era of television news, the regulations are geared to apply almost exclusively to print media and only incidentally to radio and television. Even with respect to print journalists, the regulations are clearly out of step with the times. The current regulations have not been significantly revised in nearly a half-century, and accordingly do not take into account revolutionary changes in communications technology, news gathering, and the packaging of the news for public consumption. Not only do the present regulations ignore technological advances in the field of journalism, they also fail to take into account other important changes, including the emphasis on education as opposed to experience as a hiring criterion, the public perception of journalists as professionals and the self-perception of journalists as professionals.
Comments
Available at: https://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/elr/vol16/iss2/1/