Final phase in minimum wage increase approaching
Effective July 24, 2009, the federal minimum wage for covered non-exempt employees will rise from $6.55 to $7.25 per hour. This is the final phased increase from the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, which amended the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). A separate provision of the bill brings about phased increases to the minimum wage in American Samoa and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, with the goal of bringing the minimum wage in those locations up to the general federal minimum wage over a number of years. Many states also have minimum wage laws. Covered employers must comply with both.
Tip credit. The tip credit provisions of the FLSA remain the same. An employer is still only required to pay $2.13 an hour in direct wages if that amount plus the tips received: equals at the least the federal minimum wage; the employer has informed the employee of the tip credit being taken; the employee retains all tips except to the extent they participate in a valid tip pooling arrangement, and; the employee customarily and regularly receives more than $30 a month in tips.
Youth wage. The youth minimum wage also remains the same. Employees under 20 years of age may be paid $4.25 per hour during their first 90 consecutive calendar days of employment. Every employer of employees subject to the FLSA's minimum wage provisions must post, and keep posted, a notice explaining the Act in a conspicuous place in all of their establishments so as to permit employees to readily read it. Required posters and other compliance assistance materials concerning the minimum wage increase are available on the Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division website. Learn more online, Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, www.wagehour.dol.gov, U.S. Department of Labor's toll-free help line at 1-866-4US-WAGE (487-9243).
Source: SSA/IRS Reporter, Summer 2009.
Reprinted with permission. © CCH
<p>Final phase in minimum wage increase approaching Effective July 24, 2009, the federal minimum wage for covered non exempt employees will rise from $6.55 to $7.25 per hour. This is the final phased increase from the Fair Minimum Wage Act</p>