State Minimum Wage Increase – Alaska

Alaska’s minimum wage increases 50 cents to $7.75, By Elizabeth Bluemink, January 11, 2010, Anchorage Daily News: “Thousands of Alaska’s lowest-paid workers are receiving a boost in their paychecks in the first couple weeks of this year. Due to a change in state law, the state’s minimum wage rose on Jan. 1 to $7.75 per hour. Minimum-wage earners working full time can expect a $1,040 hike in their annual salary — an additional $20 per week. That’s on top of the $4 per week increase they received in July to keep Alaska’s minimum wage even with the federal level. By the most conservative estimates, the wage hike is directly affecting more than 8,000 workers in Alaska, more than half of them adults, according to state officials. Most of them are employed at hotels and restaurants, but they also work in seafood processing, the arts, health care, construction and other jobs…”