Last Year’s Inflation Pushes Next Year’s Minimum Wage Up by Almost a Dollar

Salaried employees—who are exempt from the minimum wage and overtime requirements under Alaska Statute 23.10.055(b) as bona fide executive, administrative, or professional employees—must maintain a salary that is equivalent to two times the minimum wage for the first forty hours worked in a week. Thus, effective January 1, 2024, the minimum salary for these workers will increase from $868.00 per week (or $45,136 per year) in 2023 to $938.40 per week, or $48,796.80 per year.

The Alaska minimum wage applies to all hours worked in a pay period, regardless of how the employee is paid—whether by time, piece, commission, or otherwise. All actual hours worked in a pay period multiplied by the Alaska minimum wage is the very least an employee can be compensated by an employer unless the employer can clearly show that a specific exemption exists.

Tips do not count toward the minimum wage. Further, under Alaska law, public school bus driver wages must be no less than twice the current Alaska minimum wage. Also, certain exempt employees must be paid on a salary basis of not less than twice the current Alaska minimum wage based on a forty-hour work week to maintain their exempt status.

The federal minimum wage remains $7.25 per hour, and twenty states use that level. Workers in Alaska are entitled to the higher state-mandated minimum. Eighteen states have a higher minimum wage than Alaska.