South Dakota Minimum Wage to Increase in January

If you're making minimum wage in South Dakota, good news, you're about to get a raise in January.

Now for the bad news, it's only going to be a nickel.

If you remember, minimum wage employees received a nice bump on January 1, 2015 thanks to Initiated Measure 18 which increased the South Dakota hourly minimum wage for non-tipped employees from $7.25 to $8.50 per hour.

Built into that initiative was a guaranteed increase each year after to account for inflation. So, starting January 1, 2016 the state minimum wage will increase from $8.50 an hour to $8.55.

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The minimum wage is annually adjusted by any increase in the cost of living, as measured in the Consumer Price Index published by the U.S. Department of Labor. This year’s increase was 0.2 percent and is rounded up to the nearest five cents.

If you happen to be a minimum wage employee that is eligible for tips, you'll be making $4.28 per hour starting on January 1. Exactly half the minimum wage for non-tipped employees. Wages and tips combined must equal at least the minimum wage.

The new increases will apply to all South Dakota employers, with some limited exceptions.

Those exceptions are babysitters or outside salespersons.  It also does not apply to employees employed by an amusement or recreational establishment, an organized camp, or a religious or nonprofit educational conference center if one of the following apply:

• The establishment, camp, or center does not operate for more than seven months in any calendar year.
• During the preceding calendar year, the average receipts of the establishment, camp, or center for any six months of the calendar year were not more than thirty-three and one-third percent of its average receipts for the other six months of the year.

Source: Grand Forks Herald