Ore. minimum wage goes up Jan. 1; Wash. already highest in U.S.

PORTLAND, Ore. – On Jan. 1 the minimum wage throughout Oregon state goes up by a dime, to $8.50 an hour.

This cements Oregon and Washington's positions as the two highest-paid states for minimum-wage workers in the U.S.

Washington comes in first, at $8.55. Except for the past two years, Washington state's rate has risen steadily since voters passed Initiative 688 in 1998, which matched wage increases to inflation. Oregon comes in second.

Federal minimum wage is $7.25. The United States Department of Labor does allow employers to pay less than that wage to workers under the age of 20 for their first 90 days on the job; vocational education students; full-time students employed by retail or service establishments, agriculture or institutions of higher education; individuals whose earning or productive capacity is impaired by a physical or mental disability, including those related to age or injury. However, certificates issued by the Department of Labor’s Wage & Hour Division are required for these lower-wage jobs.

Minimum wage was one of the big issues in Oregon's gubernatorial campaigns for the Nov. 2, 2010 election. Oregon is one of only a handful of states that do not allow restaurant owners to, in effect, pay waiters and waitresses less than the minimum wage because they get tips.

The Associated Press reported that the issue of tip-pay is a partisan fault line in Oregon, where Republicans and their management backers argue for tip credits and the Democrats and their union backers against them. Tip credits reportedly were last on the front burner in 1999, when Republicans had the votes in the Legislature to pass a bill that included tip credits – as well as what are called "training wages" – below-minimum-wage pay for young people.