Who's Working for Federal Minimum Wage or Less?

The federal minimum wage in the United States has stood at $7.25 an hour since 2009. Today, this rate still applied across 20 U.S. states, most located in the country's South, Midwest and Rocky Mountain region. In the remaining 30 states, minimum wages have risen and continue to do so, opening up a gap between these states and those applying federal minimum wage.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 80.3 million workers age 16 and older earned an hourly wage in 2024, of which 843,000 earned federal minimum wage or below. This is down from a high of 4.4 million in 2010, as several states introduced higher minimum wages in the meantime and some cities have also introduced their own minimum wages, diverging from state laws. Additionally, the fact that the minimum wage hasn't changed in so long means that going rates for lower-skilled workers have increased to somewhat above the prescribed minimum in many cases, aided by the post-Covid hiring crunch when employers had to offer more to find workers. Today, only around 1 percent of hourly workers earn the federal minimum, while almost a quarter of the U.S. workforce makes less that $17 an hour.

Those working in food preparation and serving are most often earning minimum wage or below. This is due to many states carving out exceptions for tipped workers (where technically, hourly wages and tips then have to reach the minimum). Low-skilled office support as well as personal care and services work also saw many make below minimum wage, as several more exceptions apply across states, for example in small businesses, part-time youth and seasonal work and more. Also, the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which introduced federal minimum wage in the U.S., does not apply to all occupations, with some retail, service, office and agricultural as well as domestic service employees exempt. Exceptions also apply for public servants in some instances.

Women in the United States were more likely to work for minimum wage or below, with the rates of female Black and Asian minimum wage workers especially high. While 0.8 percent of male hourly workers earned minimum wage or below last year, this number was 1.3 percent for women. Minimum wage jobs affected different races and ethnicities more equally. Texas is the state with most workers at minimum wage or below (120,000), followed by Ohio (48,000), Pennsylvania (47,000) and Florida (46,000). In California and New York, there were 38,000 of these workers last year each.