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The minimum wage hikes that took effect Jan. 1 in 23 states and Washington, D.C., will bring pay increases to an estimated 8.4 million workers, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Almost 55% of the affected workers are age 25 or older, and 45% work full time.
"Although workers with only a high school degree or less education are the group most likely to be affected, 40.9% of affected workers have at least some college experience," EPI researchers note on the organization's "Working Economics Blog." "Importantly, more than 2 million parents will get a raise, including more than a million single parents. In total, we estimate that more than 5.7 million children live in households that will see an increase in earnings at the start of the new year."
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All told, according to the EPI, workers' wages will increase by more than $5 billion, with the annual average raises for impacted full-time workers ranging from $150 in Michigan (which implemented a 23-cent raise to $10.10 per hour) to $937 in Delaware (where a $1.25 raise to $11.75 per hour took effect). The biggest pay hike ($1.50) is in Nebraska, where the new minimum wage is now $10.50 per hour. The state with the highest minimum wage now is Washington, where a $1.25 increase put the hourly pay rate at $15.74, while Montana's 75-cent increase only pushed the minimum wage to $9.95 per hour.
"Because of long-standing discrimination and occupational segregation, women and workers of color make up the majority of low-wage U.S. workers," EPI researchers write. "Consequently, it is not surprising that the majority (58.7%) of workers affected by these minimum wage hikes are women, and workers of color are affected at disproportionate rates as well. The most concentrated impacts are among Hispanic workers (21.8% affected), Black workers (12.2%), and multiracial and Native American workers (14.4%) — groups that make up 20.1%, 9.5%, and 2.0% of the overall workforce in the affected states, respectively. These increases will also have a meaningful impact for workers struggling to make ends meet: 23.2% of affected workers have incomes below the poverty line, while another 26.5% have incomes below twice the poverty line."
Thirty states, along with Washington, D.C., and 46 localities, have higher minimum wages than the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour.
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