FLSA Coverage: The Two Tests That Decide If It Applies

The federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) does not cover every job automatically. According to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Fact Sheet #14 (Revised July 2009), coverage runs through one of two doors: “enterprise coverage,” tied to a business’s annual dollar volume or its type, and “individual coverage,” tied to whether an employee’s own work regularly touches interstate commerce (DOL Fact Sheet #14). This article explains only what those two doors are and how the fact sheet defines them — it does not determine whether any particular employer or job actually qualifies.

This original record-reading guide is a general reading aid, not cited evidence. It does not depict a source record; the article text and source links provide the facts.

Key points

• Fact Sheet #14 was last “Revised July 2009” (DOL).
• Enterprise coverage generally requires an “annual dollar volume of sales or business done of at least $500,000” (DOL).
• Certain organizations are covered regardless of dollar volume: “hospitals, businesses providing medical or nursing care for residents, schools and preschools, and government agencies” (DOL).
• Individual coverage applies “even when there is no enterprise coverage,” if an employee’s work “regularly involves them in commerce between States” (DOL).
• “Domestic service workers (such as housekeepers, full-time babysitters, and cooks) are normally covered by the law” (DOL).

Fact Sheet 14 scope

The Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division fact sheet on FLSA coverage is dated “Revised July 2009” (DOL Fact Sheet #14). That date matters because it also frames the wage figure the fact sheet itself restates: “$7.25 per hour effective July 24, 2009” (DOL). This article is limited to what that same fact sheet says about who the law reaches in the first place — not to any broader history of the minimum wage rate.

The first door: enterprise coverage

Enterprise coverage looks at the business as a whole, not the individual employee. The fact sheet sets a dollar threshold: an “annual dollar volume of sales or business done of at least $500,000” (DOL). Separately, some kinds of organizations are covered automatically, without regard to that dollar figure — specifically “hospitals, businesses providing medical or nursing care for residents, schools and preschools, and government agencies” (DOL).

The second door: individual coverage

Even where enterprise coverage does not apply, a worker can still be covered on an individual basis. The fact sheet states: “Even when there is no enterprise coverage, employees are protected by the FLSA if their work regularly involves them in commerce between States (‘interstate commerce’)” (DOL). The fact sheet also names one category by default: “Domestic service workers (such as housekeepers, full-time babysitters, and cooks) are normally covered by the law” (DOL).

What this article does not answer

This article does not decide whether any specific employer clears the $500,000 enterprise-coverage threshold, and it does not decide whether any specific job involves interstate commerce for purposes of individual coverage — both are fact-specific determinations the source document leaves to the particular circumstances. It also does not address what happens, or what wage floor applies, when only individual coverage (and not enterprise coverage) applies to a worker. It does not say whether an employer that falls outside FLSA coverage might still be covered by a state wage law; the fact sheet is silent on that question. Finally, beyond restating the fact sheet’s own historical figure of $7.25 per hour effective July 24, 2009, this article makes no claim about the current federal minimum wage rate or its legal status.

Source links

https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/14-flsa-coverage