Opinion ID: 3011011
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Policy of the Statute

Text: As noted above, New Jersey courts have held that the Commissioner's authority to promulgate wage ordersis of necessity restrained by the declared policy and spirit of the statute, and the rules and regulations and administrative action cannot subvert or enlarge upon the statutory policy or . . . . deviate from the principle and policy of the statute. Hotel Suburban, 125 A.2d at 911 (internal quotation omitted). Further, [a]n administrative regulation . . . [cannot] frustrate the legislative policy. Medical Society, 575 A.2d at 1352. Therefore, we must examine the wage order and the justification given by the Commissioner for its promulgation to determine whether the order is consistent with the declared policy of the Wage and Hour Law. The primary rationale asserted by the Commissioner for establishing a wage board to examine the trucking industry and for adopting the board's recommendation was thatthe application of the [statutory] overtime provision could result in the flight of business with the resulting reduction in employment in this industry. 28 N.J. Reg. at 3799. By contrast, the declared policy of the Wage and Hour Law is to safeguard [workers'] health, efficiency, and general wellbeing and to protect them as well as their employers from the effects of serious and unfair competition resulting from wage levels detrimental to their health, efficiency and wellbeing. N.J. Stat. Ann. S 34:11 56a. In a number of cases, 17 New Jersey courts have noted that the Wage and Hour Law is social legislation designed to correct abuses in employment, Male, 251 A.2d at 467, and that [t]he humanitarian and remedial nature of this legislation requires that any exemption therefrom be narrowly construed. Yellow Cab Co. v. State, 312 A.2d 870, 873 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 1973). We think it beyond dispute that a policy of protecting local trucking businesses from competition (even if this will redound to the benefit of these businesses' employees) is fundamentally different from the stated legislative policy of protecting workers from unfair wage levels detrimental to their health, efficiency and well-being. When the declared policy behind a statute is to protect workers from abusive practices regarding low wages and excessive hours, a regulation excluding a group of workers from this protective legislation's coverage, under the guise of keeping a local industry competitive, frustrate[s] the legislative policy, Medical Society, 575 A.2d at 1352, and usurpsthe authority to classify and exempt[, which] lies with the Legislature, Hotel Suburban, 125 A.2d at 914. While we believe that the plain language of the statute and its clearly stated policy inexorably lead to the conclusion that the Commissioner does not have the authority to exempt a group of employees, not otherwise exempted by the statute, from the law's minimum wage or overtime requirements, we also find support for our conclusion in the major changes made to the law in 1966. As noted above, under the pre-1966 law, no minimum wages or overtime pay requirements existed in the statute itself, while the Commissioner was explicitly authorized to promulgate such protective devices for certain groups of workers. In 1966, the law was fundamentally changed, and minimum wage and overtime pay requirements were established for all workers (with certain enumerated exceptions) in the statute. Under the new law, the Commissioner's authority changed substantially, from promulgating wage orders for any group of workers not explicitly excluded from that authority, cf. Hotel Suburban, 125 A.2d at 912, to issuing wage orders that bring excluded employees under the law's coverage, cf. Male, 251 A.2d at 18 467. There is, however, no indication that the legislature intended, in making this change, to confer on the Commissioner an entirely different authority to exempt employees who would otherwise be included within the new statute's broad coverage.8