State Minimum Wage Update

With the most recent hike in the federal minimum wage from $6.55 to $7.25 per hour, there are now 28 states with the same minimum wage. All of these states share the $7.25 minimum wage rate:  Alaska, Arizona, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Iowa, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Some of these states, like Hawaii and Kentucky, had already implemented a minimum wage of $7.25. Others, such as Texas, Utah, Maryland and Indiana, adopt the federal minimum wage automatically. In some of those states, the July 2009 increase was relatively minor. The Florida minimum wage, for example, increased from $7.21 to $7.25 per hour while New York and New Jersey increased from $7.15 to $7.25 per hour.

Even such insignificant increases require employers to update their federal and state minimum wage posters, of course.

Four states have minimum wages lower than the federal rate. Kansas has the dubious honor of being the state with the lowest minimum wage at $2.65 per hour – although that rate will change later this year. The others are:

Arkansas                   $6.25

Minnesota                 $6.15

Wyoming                   $5.15

However, those states do not offer the lowest wages. Five states have never passed a minimum wage law: South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and Tennessee. In those states, wages are a private matter between the employer and the employee. Unless the employee is covered by the federal minimum wage law (and most are), the employer can pay any hourly wage he or she likes.

Thirteen states plus the District of Columbia have minimum wages that are higher than the federal rate. The are, in alphabetical order:

California                              $8.00

Colorado                               $7.28

Connecticut                          $8.00

District of Columbia             $8.25

Illinois                                    $8.00

Massachusetts                     $8.00

Michigan                               $7.40

Nevada                                  $7.55

New Mexico                          $7.50 

Ohio                                       $7.30

Oregon                                  $8.40

Rhode Island                        $7.40

Vermont                                $8.06

Washington                          $8.55 

The highest state minimum wage is in Washington, at $8.55 per hour. Oregon is second at $8.40 per hour while Vermont is third with a minimum wage of $8.06 per hour. Those states are likely to remain in the top 3, since each of them implements an annual cost-of-living increase

Illinois, Massachusetts, Connecticut and California are tied in fourth place with a state minimum wage of $8.00 per hour. None of those states has an annual cost-of-living increase.

When an employee is covered by both state and federal law, the employee is entitled to protection under whichever law offers the greater benefit. An employee who is covered by both state and federal minimum wage law in Kansas is entitled to the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour rather than the Kansas minimum wage of $2.65 per hour. An employee who is covered by both state and federal minimum wage in Oregon is entitled to the higher state rate of $8.40 per hour.