Today, employees earning between $455 and $1,923 in weekly salaries (or $23,660 and $100,000 in annual pay) are in a separate category under the FLSA OT rules. In order to avoid their being unjustly exempted from coverage, the law requires the application of a complicated duties test.. A salary test set at the inflation-adjusted level of the short test in 1975â$970 per week in 2012 dollars. Below this level, salaried employees would not be exempt, whatever their duties might be, and would be guaranteed overtime pay for work in excess of 40 hours a week.