OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — Washington state’s minimum wage will increase by 12 cents to $8.67 on Jan. 1.
The state Department of Labor and Industries’ decision came after a three-week delay brought on by conflicting legal opinions raised by the state attorney general and the authors of the 1998 voter initiative that ties the minimum wage to the consumer price index.
While Washington state’s current rate of $8.55 an hour is the highest state minimum wage in the nation, a few cities, like San Francisco and Santa Fe, N.M. have their own laws and have higher minimum wages.
Oregon, which also has an initiative-based minimum wage law, announced last month that its minimum wage was going up by 10 cents to $8.50 an hour next year.
