Florida’s Minimum Wage in 2020
Florida’s minimum wage in 2020 is $8.56 an hour. For tipped employees the 2020 minimum wage rate is $5.44 an hour. Since Florida’s current minimum wage of $8.56 exceeds the Federal minimum wage of $7.25, Florida’s minimum wage prevails for employees in Florida. It is illegal for employers to pay less than the minimum wage.
Florida’s minimum wage rate is adjusted for inflation annually. The adjustment is done by applying the percentage change in the Consumer Price Index to the prior year’s minimum wage rate. The new minimum wage is then determined by adding the change amount to the prior year’s minimum wage rate.
Sadly this method does not result in the minimum wage rate increasing to match inflation or other economic realities. For example, Florida’s minimum wage for 2020 was increased by only 10 cents from the 2019 minimum wage rate of $8.46. The 2019 minimum wage rate was increased by only 21 cents from the 2018 rate of $8.25. For more information, visit the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity, Bureau of Labor Market Statistics.
In fact, if the minimum wage had kept pace with productivity over the past 48 years (i.e., how much we can produce, on average, for an hour’s worth of work), the minimum wage would have been over $19.00 an hour in 2017.
The Fair Wage Amendment would Increase the Minimum Wage to $15.00
However, Florida voters will have a chance to change this on November 3, 2020. The Fair Wage Amendment, also known as Amendment 2, will appear on this year’s election ballot. If approved, the Amendment would gradually increase the minimum wage rate in Florida to $15.00 an hour.
The Amendment would do so by making incremental increases each year. First, the hourly minimum wage would increase to $10.00 in 2021 and then increase by $1.00 each year until reaching $15.00 an hour by 2026. Future increases would be calculated by the cost of living estimations as Florida’s Constitution currently requires.