When hiring new employees, one of the most important decisions a small business owner has to make is how much to pay them. When you set pay rates, especially for hourly employees, you need to know the laws regarding how much they have to be paid. Federal and state minimum wage laws impose a baseline for how much you have to pay your employees. The law, Assembly Bill 1228, boosts fast food workers’ earnings from the state’s minimum wage of $16 per hour to $20 per hour. The Full-time Student Program is for full-time students employed in retail or service stores, agriculture, or colleges and universities.
The U.S. Department of Labor enforces the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which sets basic minimum wage and overtime pay standards. These standards are enforced by the Department’s Wage and Hour Division. The minimum wage increased to $14.00 on July 1, 2022, and $15.00 on June 1, 2023. “It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.” The New York minimum wage equals the federal minimum wage when set below the federal rate.
Minimum wage in the United States
Disabilities that can affect production capacity include blindness, cerebral palsy, alcohol and drug addiction, mental illness, and developmental disabilities. Minimum wage rates exceed the federal rate in 30 states and the District of Columbia as of January 2024. The District of Columbia has the highest minimum wage at $17 per hour. State Minimum Wage LawsA clickable map that tells you what the minimum wage laws are in each state. The Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division administers and enforces the federal minimum wage law.
The employer that hires the student can obtain a certificate from the Department of Labor which allows the student to be paid not less than 75% of the minimum wage, for as long as the student is enrolled in the vocational education program. “This policy is going to be really different in different parts of California,” says Jacob Vigdor, professor of public policy and governance at the University of Washington, who has studied the effects of Seattle’s 2014 minimum wage hike. The new state minimum uniquely focuses on a particular segment, fast food, affecting some of the country’s biggest chains, including McDonald’s, Starbucks, Subway and Pizza Hut.
Pizza Hut workers in L.A.’s Historic Filipinotown go on 3-day strike, alleging wage theft
Over the past decade, California has doubled its minimum wage for most workers to $16 per hour. A big concern over that time was whether the increase would cause some workers to lose their jobs as employers’ expenses increased. minimum wages Other programs that allow for payment of less than the full federal minimum wage apply to workers with disabilities, full-time students, and student-learners employed pursuant to sub-minimum wage certificates.
A minimum wage is the lowest wage that a worker may be paid per hour. Nonexempt workers can’t be offered a job or agree to work for less than this amount. Various minimum wage exceptions apply under specific circumstances to workers with disabilities, full-time students, youth under age 20 in their first 90 consecutive calendar days of employment, tipped employees and student-learners. But the dramatic pay raise has also touched off a heated debate about the impact on local businesses. Smaller franchise restaurant owners warn they’ll have to raise prices, reduce worker’s hours, cut jobs or even close shop. Starting April 1, 2024, all “fast food restaurant employees” who are covered by the new law must be paid at least $20.00 per hour.