Another year is drawing closer, and with it comes another minimum wage increase for California. Nikki Mahmoudi and Tomiwa Aina review the expected minimum wage increases for 2025 in this episode of California Employment News.

Watch this episode on the Weintraub YouTube channel.

Nikki:

Hi, everyone. Thank you for joining us for this installment of California Employment News, an informative video and podcast resource offered by the Labor and Employment Group here at Weintraub Tobin. My name is Nikki Mahmoudi, and I’m an associate in the group, and I’m joined by my fellow associate, Tomiwa Aina. So another year has come by with another minimum wage increase. So today we’re going to be talking about the minimum wage increases seeing for 2025 so far. As of January 1, 2025, California’s minimum wage will increase from $16 an hour to $16.50. The reason for this being is once the state minimum wage hit $15 an hour, the minimum wage rate has been adjusted annually for inflation based on the National Consumer Price Index for urban wage earners and clinical workers. A few things to note with that is the minimum wage cannot be lowered even if there’s a negative consumer price index. At the same time, the highest raise allowed in any one year is 3.5%. Another thing you want to keep in mind is sometimes, let’s say a jurisdiction is going to have a higher wage than the state minimum wage. We want to go with that higher minimum wage number. Additionally, certain industries may also have a higher minimum wage. Tomiwa, could you tell me more about examples where we’re seeing that higher minimum wage?

Tomiwa:

Of course, Nikki. As of July 1, 2024, certain localities have increased their minimum wage. For example, in Alameda, it was increased to $17 per hour. Emeryville increased their minimum wage to $19 and 36 cents per hour. Santa Monica increased it to $17.27 per hour, and San Francisco increased it to $18.67 per hour. There are also minimum wages that are specific to industries. For example, there is a higher minimum wage for certain fast food workers that’s been effective as of April 1, 2024, and that requires them to be paid at least $20 per hour. Then as of October 16, 2024, certain healthcare workers are going to be eligible to receive a higher minimum wage compared to the state minimum wage. You can expect a CEN episode dedicated just to that increase. Thank you very much all. That’s it for now. You can continue to find our video series and podcast through the LElawblog.com or on Weintraub Tobin’s YouTube channel. Thank you everyone for joining us, and we look forward to reconnecting with you with the next edition of California Employment News.