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Arizona Minimum Wage

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What is the 2008 Arizona minimum wage?

The Arizona minimum wage went up to match the cost of living, effective January 1, 2008, and is now at $6.90 an hour.

Arizona statute requires that the minimum wage go up annually to meet the Consumer Price Index (CPI), more specifically the CPI of all Urban Consumers for the 12 months ending in August of the year before.

The 2008 rate hike, amounting to 15 cents an hour, is a little more than the CPI inflation index up to August of 2007. It’s “a little more” because the law says the rate must be rounded to the nearest 5-cent increment. The CPI was actually 2%, which amounted to 13.5 cents an hour – thus the rounding up to 15 cents an hour, for a rate of $6.90 instead of the more cumbersome $6.885.

The state’s Minimum Wage Initiative requires the Industrial Commission of Arizona to fix the rate every year according to the CPI. The law, A.R.S. 23-363, states specifically that “The minimum wage shall be increased on January 1, 2008 and on January 1 of successive years by the increase in the cost of living.”

The state has also passed a “Policy Statement” addressing “hours worked” under the Minimum Wage Act of Arizona, with two sets of guidelines depending on whether the employee works a shift of less than or more than 24 hours.

Employees working less than 24 hours in a shift are considered working the entire period, even if those employees are allowed to sleep or become involved in other personal activities when not occupied by the job. A switchboard operator who is allowed to sleep when not answering calls would still be considered working during those periods for the purposes of calculating minimum wage.

Workers like firefighters may work a shift that lasts longer than 24 hours. In those cases the employer and employee can negotiate what are considered “bona fide” meal periods and sleep periods as long as those periods do not exceed 8 hours during any one 24-hour period.

The Arizona minimum wage is more generous than the federal rate of $5.85.  JH