Ohio Plans to Raise Minimum Wage

In 2022, Ohio’s minimum wage is planned to raise from $8.80 to $9.30 per hour for non-tipped employees. For tipped employees, wages will be increased from $4.40 to $4.65 per hour. This will be the largest single year increase since 2007.

This wage increase will apply to those who work at businesses with an annual gross of at least $342,000 yearly. For smaller companies and those under sixteen legally allowed to work, the state minimum is the same as the federal wage, or $7.25 per hour, as state officials said.

State officials also mentioned that this increase is due to, “the Constitutional Amendment (II-34a) passed by Ohio voters in November 2006 states Ohio’s minimum wage shall increase on Jan. 1 of each year by the rate of inflation. The state minimum wage is tied to the Consumer Price index (CPI-W) for urban wage earners and clerical workers for the 12-month period prior to September. This CPI-W index increased by 5.8 percent over the 12-month period from Sept. 1, 2020, to Aug. 31, 2021.”

Ohio researcher Michael Shields previously mentioned that the minimum wage for Ohio should be around $12 per hour if it had kept up with inflation. He then went on to state that “one of the things that we’ve seen with the COVID-19 crisis, is a lot of the folks, the essential workers that we all depend on to get through the crisis, are some of the folks who are the lowest paid in the state.”

There has also been a fight to raise the hourly wage to $15.00 per hour. Policy Matters Ohio stated that “a $15 minimum wage by 2026 would benefit nearly 1.6 million Ohio workers; improve fairness in pay; and buoy the economy by directing $4.9 billion per year to the workers who most need to spend it. Ending separate treatment for tipped workers is a critical part of the policy solution and would generate another $1.2 billion.”