For better or for worse, in America, talking about how much money you make is taboo. If you find the subject distasteful, look away now! Let’s be honest: at the very least, we all wish to earn a living wage to support ourselves and our families. A love of science alone cannot keep hungry mouths fed and a roof over our heads. After graduation, our vast experience, including years of higher education, hard work, and proven dedication to science (while earning a rather meager stipend), should be rewarded with higher pay. Frankly, one of the many reasons graduates are shying away from the traditional academic postdoc position is due to salary. Based on the academic postdocs I know, the position is essentially Graduate School Part II that requires even more time in the lab and more responsibility with only a minor increase in salary. The NIH minimum funding requirements for postdocs in the 2016 fiscal year starts at only $43,692 a year. Not only is that a pretty low number, especially considering the cost of living in many major metropolitan areas, but the hours postdocs put in on nights and weekends do not qualify for overtime pay. The question is: why wouldn’t we look to industry positions, non-academic postdocs, or other career options that either pay significantly more or at least allow us a more flexible work schedule with no unpaid overtime hours? 
Here’s the good news—postdocs in academia are getting a raise. A new overtime rule put forth by the Department of Labor, which goes into effect on December 1st of this year, requires that full-time salaried employees who make under $47,476 a year become eligible for overtime pay (up from the previous threshold of $23,660). This includes the nearly forty thousand postdoctoral researchers in academia who are funded on NIH grants. Overall, schools will have two options: have postdocs fill out timesheets and pay overtime hours accordingly, or bump up their base salaries to the new level. Postdocs receiving funds from postdoc-specific grants such as the Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (which many universities base their postdoctoral salaries on) will be receiving increased pay as well. 
Of course, all good things come with some consequences. Biomedical research doesn’t fit into a neat forty-hour-per-week time scale. If universities switched to a timecard format, some PIs may be tempted to pressure their postdocs to only work forty hours a week or only report forty hours on their timecard despite actually working more. This scenario would not only be unproductive and impossible (who can fit all of their bench work in forty hours a week?), but also dishonest and wrong. This system would only work properly if everyone were honest about the hours they were in the lab. Regardless of the method chosen to properly compensate postdocs, there will be consequences monetarily for the PI. In the 2000 fiscal year, the R01 grant limit was set to $250,000 per year. During that year, a fresh graduate could expect to get an academic postdoc position at the minimum $26,916 salary. The R01 grant limit has not increased since 2000; but with the postdoc salary rising over the years, and finally jumping to at least $47,476 starting this December, postdocs are becoming a larger percentage of a grant’s overall budget. Reagents and equipment aren’t getting any cheaper, so we all know what that means: fewer available postdoctoral positions. Unless funding sources increase their limits, this will be the unfortunate outcome. Read more about how the new overtime rule impacts postdocs in a blog by the NIH Director, Francis S. Collins, and US Secretary of Labor, Thomas E. Perez, here.
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