9 things to know about the history of minimum wage

Hundreds of thousands of Americans go to work every day to be paid minimum wage. But do you know how the minimum wage came to be?

Channel 9 compiled nine facts about the history of the minimum wage that you may not know.

When Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, it marked the first time the federal government set a minimum wage. According to History.com, it established the principle that people, or at least those covered by the law, are entitled to a minimum amount of pay for their work.
The first minimum wage law was enacted in 1894 in New Zealand, according to the Center for Poverty Research at the University of California, Davis.
In 1938, the minimum wage in the U.S. was first set at 25 cents.
Since the establishment of the minimum wage it has been raised 22 times by 12 different presidents, according to History.com
The last increase to the minimum wage came July 2009 when it was set at $7.25 for all covered, nonexempt workers.
In addition to a federal minimum wage, some states also have their own minimum wages, codified either in a state statute or in the state’s constitution, according to the Legal Information Institute.
Twenty-nine states and Washington, D.C., maintain higher minimum wages than the federal standard as of 2019, with eight states automatically increasing wages based on the cost of living, according to History.com
Florida’s basic minimum rate per hour is $8.56, which is adjusted annually based on a set formula.
According to the Pew Research Center, adjusted for inflation, the federal minimum wage peaked in 1968 at $8.68 — in 2016 dollars. The center said since then the federal minimum has lost about 9.6% of its purchasing power to inflation.

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