Illinois Minimum Wage Posters
Posted by Tamara
Small business owners need to update their Illinois minimum wage posters this summer as the state rate increased yet again.
This summer, the minimum wage in Illinois is tied for fourth-highest in the U.S.
Only Washington, Vermont and Oregon will have higher minimum wages. Illinois shares fourth place with Massachusetts, California, and Connecticut.
The change took place on July 1, 2009, when the rate went up from $7.75 an hour to $8.00 an hour, an increase of 25 cents.
The next increase in the minimum wage in Illinois comes on July 1, 2010, when it goes up another 25 cents an hour, to $8.25.
Over five years, the Illinois minimum wage has increased by $2.85 an hour. Effective 2004, it increased from $5.15 to $5.50 hourly, and then went up to $6.50.
According to the Illinois Department of Labor, the new hike should affect roughly 650,000 Illinois employees.
“For thousands of working families who live on the brink of poverty,” said Beatrice Jackson, President of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), “the increase in Illinois’ minimum wage will help workers afford basic necessities that so many of us take for granted like food, clothing, housing, and education.”
There are some exceptions allowable in the Illinois state minimum wage bill. For example, tipped workers received just $4.80 an hour effective July 1, 2009. Workers may also be paid a lower rate, called a “training wage,” at $7.25 an hour, during their first 90 days on the job. Employers may also pay a wage lower than the statutory minimum to those workers who are under 18 years old.
The now-notorious former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich signed the legislation hiking the minimum wage by 25 cents an hour every year from 2007 to 2010, when it reaches the $8.25 an hour mark. The former governor in 2003 signed a law hiking the state’s minimum wage from $5.15 to $5.50 effective in 2004.
“I’m proud,” said Blagojevich, who has since been indicted on federal corruption charges, including the accusation that he tried to sell a Senate seat, “that in Illinois, we’ve kept our promise to help working people and make their lives easier after years of neglect at the federal level.”
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