Professional Exemption

Learned Professionals

The FLSA clearly states that a worker’s job title, or the employer’s name for the position, cannot determine exempt status for learned professionals.

For an employee to qualify for the learned professional employee exemption, each of the following job tests on the FLSA professional exemption checklist must be met:

• • The employee must be compensated on a salary basis at a rate not less than $455 per week
  • The employee’s primary duty must be the performance of work requiring advanced knowledge (work which is predominantly intellectual in character that requires the consistent exericse of discretion and judgment)

The employee’s “primary duty” is the principal or most important duty that the employee performs or which characterizes their job as a whole.

• • The advanced knowledge must be in a field of science or learning

Examples include law, medicine, theology, accounting, engineering, architecture, teaching, pharmacy, physical, chemical, and biological sciences, and others.

• • The advanced knowledge must be customarily acquired by a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction

Academic training or degrees are prerequisites for entry into the profession.

Creative Professionals

Creative professionals are also classified according to job duties.

To qualify for the creative professional employee exemption, each of the following job tests must be met:

• • The employee must be compensated on a salary or fee basis at a rate not less than $455 per week
  • The employee’s primary duty must be the performance of work requiring invention, imagination, originality or talent in a recognized field of artistic or creative endeavor

In this sense, creative work is distinct from work which primarily relies on intelligence, diligence, and accuracy.

Teachers

Teachers are considered exempt professionals under federal law if their primary duty is to teach, instruct, tutor, or lecture in an educational establishment.

Examples of exempt teachers include:

• Pre-school and nursey school teachers
• Primary and secondary school teachers
• Teachers of skilled and semi-skilled trades
• Arts and music teachers
• Automobile driving and aircraft flight instructors

Salary requirements to do not apply to exempt teachers under the FLSA.

Professionals in Law and Medicine

Properly licensed employees practicing medicine or law are considered exempt professionals under federal law. Legal and medical interns and residents are also considered exempt.

Salary requirements do not apply to exempt medical and legal professionals under the FLSA.

Highly Compensated Employees

The professional exemption may apply to certain high-paid professional workers, as well.

The highly compensated employee exemption, or HCE exemption, applies to professional, administrative, or executive employees who:

1. Earn at least $100,000 a year, including a minimum of $455 in weekly salary
2. Primarily perform office or non-manual work
3. Regularly perform at least one of the exempt duties of an executive described in the job tests above