Labor & Employment Law Blog

California health care employers will recall that Governor Newsom signed SB 525 into law in October 2023, setting into motion planned increases to the required minimum wage for certain health care employees who work at covered health care facilities. SB 525 required increases to the health care minimum wage to begin in June 2024, but the law’s start date became a matter of confusion and chaos, with the State first delaying SB 525’s start date to July 1, 2024 based upon budgetary concerns, only to then delay it again until at least October 15, 2024.

On January 1, 2024, California’s statewide minimum wage rate increased to $16 per hour. Alongside this hike to the minimum wage, the base salary requirement for California employees exempt under the administrative, professional, and executive exemptions increased to an annualized salary of $66,560.

The local minimum wage will increase on July 1, 2024 in the following locations in California:

Lately, Deputy Labor Commissioners have been making unannounced visits to fast food stores in Los Angeles County to conduct audits. They arrive, sometimes alone, and sometimes in pairs, and ask for the manager.  The Deputy Labor Commissioners insist on conducting the audit while they are on the premises, and they have not been amenable to requests to come back on a date and time that is more convenient.  Below, please find useful information about the types of information that will be sought by the Deputy Labor Commissioners if you are subject to such an audit.

On July 31, 2023, California’s Director of Finance certified that the state’s minimum wage for all employers will increase to $16 per hour, effective on January 1, 2024. 

This announcement followed the completion of an annual review by the state’s Department of Finance in order to determine if the minimum wage must be increased due to inflation and, if so, to calculate the new minimum wage in accordance with state Labor Code requirements.

With the local minimum wage in several California cities increasing on July 1^st, employers should take time to verify that they are meeting the minimum wage requirements of the cities in which they operate and prepare for any increases.

The following cities and counties in California are scheduled to increase minimum wage rates on July 1, 2018.