Washington’s minimum wage will rise 54 cents on Jan. 1 to $16.28 an hour, the State Department of Labor and Industries (L&I) announced. That’s a 3.4% increase over 2023, when the state’s minimum wage was the highest in the nation at $15.74.
Under a state law passed by voters, L&I calculates how much minimum wage goes up each year by comparing the year-over-year change of the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) from August. The pay rate applies to workers age 16 and older. Workers who are 14 or 15 years old can be paid as little as 85% of minimum wage. (In 2024, that will be $13.84.) Cities can set minimum wages higher than the state, so Seattle, SeaTac, and Tukwila have higher wages.
Oregon’s minimum wage got its annual boost July 1, when it rose 70 cents an hour, reaching $15.45 in the Portland metro area. The minimum wage is $13.20 in rural counties of Eastern Oregon, and $14.20 in the rest of the state outside the Portland metro area. This year’s increase was the first that ties Oregon’s minimum wage to inflation based on CPI in March.
