Florida’s minimum wage for non-tipped employees will increase January 1 to $7.67 an hour, a 4.9 percent increase from the $7.31 an hour minimum for 2011, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity reported over the weekend.
Wages for tipped employees will rise to $4.65 an hour, up from $4.29. The wage increase is based on the increase of the federal Consumer Price Index for urban wage workers in the southeastern United States.
Following a 2004 constitutional amendment, Florida is among 10 states that automatically raise minimum wage rates.
The federal rate, now $7.25 an hour, must be raised by an act of Congress. The state was sued earlier this year for using an inflation calculation that reduced the annual increase for Jan. 1 by factoring in a deflationary period in 2009.
