California Considering Minimum Wage Hike
Topics: New Laws & Legislation
California's Legislature is considering AB10 this session, which would increase California's minimum wage from the current $8 per hour to $8.25 per hour next year, to $8.75 per hour in 2015, and to $9.25 per hour in 2016. Beginning in 2017 and thereafter, the minimum wage would be automatically adjusted upward based on the state's inflation rate. Recent legislative efforts to increase California's minimum wage rate have failed and it is not clear whether this bill will fare differently. However, the bill did recently pass the Assembly Labor and Employment Committee. California's minimum wage is already one of the highest in the country. Only a handful of states have minimum wage rates higher than California's.
On the federal level, legislation has also been introduced to raise the federal minimum wage from the current $7.25 per hour to $8.20 per hour three months after the legislation is passed, to $9.15 per hour one year after the legislation is passed, and to $10.10 per hour two years after the legislation is passed. Starting the third year after the legislation is passed, the federal minimum wage would be automatically adjusted upward based on teh Consumer Price Index. The federal legislation, known as the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013, would also increase the minimum wage for tipped employees over the next three years from $2.13 per hour to 70% of the minimum wage.
We will post developments on this and other employment-related legislation here.