labor lawAdivision of labor law center

Now, my loyal readers, in Pennsylvania and otherwise, I know the question that is forming on your lips—how will the state minimum wage play into this training and vocation program set up by Gov. Rendell in Pennsylvania? Well, that is a good question, and one I think I know part of the answer for.

Remember, one of the issues in Arizona is that the state used to have an exemption for the Arizona minimum wage for its disabled workers. And that is because there wasn’t a true Arizona minimum wage law per se before 2007. It used to be that Arizona employers would just have to follow the wage and hours and the federal minimum wage contained in the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Well, in the Fair Labor Standards Act, there is an exclusion in there for disabled workers, that allows employers to pay these disabled workers a fair rate for the productivity given to them by their disabled workers. So we can translate this situation to Pennsylvania, even though it does not any longer hold true for the state of Arizona.

In Pennsylvania, then, any employer who is liable to follow the Fair Labor Standards Act must follow the federal minimum wage labor law rules. Why? Well, the Pennsylvania minimum wage is $5.15 per hour, the same as the federal minimum wage at the moment, so the Pennsylvania minimum wage does not trump the federal minimum wage.

So employers who are large (and bring in more than $500,000 in revenue per year) or who operate on an interstate basis, all are liable to follow the Fair Labor Standards Act, among some others. That means that they would not have to pay the disabled workers coming out this new Rendell program the full minimum wage, unless Gov. Rendell’s law specifically calls for it.

Last 10 posts by Mark

• North Carolina Federal Minimum Wage Alert - June 11th, 2007
• New York Federal Minimum Wage Alert - June 11th, 2007
• Arizona Workers' Comp Compromise - June 11th, 2007
• New Mexico Federal Minimum Wage Alert - June 10th, 2007
• New Jersey Federal Minimum Wage Alert - June 10th, 2007
• Maine Leaving Wage Law Not Leaving - June 10th, 2007
• New York Family Leave Law Leaving? - June 10th, 2007
• New Hampshire Federal Minimum Wage Alert - June 10th, 2007
• Whistleblower Protection Changes - June 10th, 2007
• Discrimination Law Suits Legal Case - June 10th, 2007