I think what drives the granting of bigger and better titles is the insatiable desire for same from young people who don't have a lot of work experience but are

I think what drives the granting of bigger and better titles is the insatiable desire for same from young people who don't have a lot of work experience but are eager to feel like they are moving up the ladder of success quickly and their accomplishments are being recognized. (this is why a number of "famous" places use "Member Technical Staff with the single bump of Distinguished and it's also why you have the urge to roll your eyes when you encounter a teenaged C-suite looking for seed capital. not saying teens with a startup aren't worthy of respect, but you'll be apt to want to know "which one is the coder, designer, and marketer?") >We find widespread evidence of firms appearing to avoid paying overtime wages by exploiting a federal law that allows them to do so for employees termed as “managers” and paid a salary above a pre-defined dollar threshold. this is published by NBER, a very academic economics driven enterprise, so let me point out something they should have but didn't: TANSTAAFL. There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. And I'm not talking about the employers getting a free lunch. if you (tech workers) think you'll be able to convert your high-hourly-equivalent-wage into a higher-hourly-equivalent-wage-with-overtime-pay, no, not going to happen, at least not in the long term, unless of course your productivity were to climb by a commensurate amount. The market (labor supply and labor demand) sets the wages and TANSTAAFL. You might find a work-life balance that you personally like better (for instance no overtime pay, no overtime work) but that's not better for all people and after the payment system adjusts (for instance erode workers' base pay, then entice longer hours with larger overtime payments) it will settle into a new equilibrium which does not include free lunch.