Boston University Graduate School of Management Professor David Weil has been confirmed as the administrator of the US Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division. Weil will be responsible for enforcing laws designed to protect the nation’s workers.
In his new role, Weil will oversee a division that ensures American workers are adequately compensated for the work they do by being paid the minimum wage and required overtime compensation. The division also protects responsible employers from competition with companies that do not comply with federal wage and hour requirements by enforcing the Fair Labor Standards Act, which is also responsible for regulating child labor.
Weil will also be in charge of overseeing compliance with the Family and Medical Leave Act, wage garnishment provisions of the Consumer Credit Protection Act and employment standards and worker protections as provided in several immigration-related statutes.
Nominated to the post by President Obama last September, Weil was confirmed by a 51-42 vote by the US Senate in late April and sworn in on May 5.
Since arriving at BU in 1992, Weil, an Everett W. Lord Distinguished Faculty Scholar at SMG, is the recipient of SMG’s Broderick Prize in Research and Broderick Prize for Teaching, as well as the Shingo Prize for Research on Manufacturing Innovations.
He was chosen as SMG’s Best MBA Instructor of the Year in 2011 and 2012. He has been the co-director and a senior research fellow at the Transparency Policy Project at the Ash Institute at the Harvard Kennedy School since 2002 and a research fellow at Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program since 1987.
Weil will hold the post through the end of the Obama administration and says he “fully intends” to return to BU when the job is complete.