The federal minimum wage hasn't moved in 17 years — the longest stretch on record
Summary
The federal minimum wage has been $7.25 an hour since July 24, 2009, the longest stretch without an increase since the Fair Labor Standards Act took effect in 1938. Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' own inflation calculator, that 2009 rate would need to be $11.28 today to buy what it bought then — and in 2024, 843,000 hourly workers were still paid at or below the unchanged $7.25 floor.
What the rate is actually worth
A wage that stays flat in dollars does not stay flat in what it buys. Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' own CPI Inflation Calculator, the $7.25 set in July 2009 would need to be $11.28 in May 2026 — the most recent month priced in — to buy what it bought when it took effect. Today's $7.25 buys about 64.3% of that: a 35.7% loss of purchasing power packed into a rate that, on paper, has not changed at all.
The wage floor has been higher, in real terms, than it is now. The same BLS calculator shows the $1.60 rate set in February 1968 — the historic peak, per the Department of Labor's own rate table — would be worth $15.68 today. On that measure, the current $7.25 floor sits at less than half the highest real value the federal minimum wage has ever had.
View data as table
| 1968 rate, in today's dollars | $15.68/hr | peak real value, BLS CPI calculator |
|---|---|---|
| 2009 rate, in today's dollars | $11.28/hr | BLS CPI calculator |
| 2026 nominal rate | $7.25/hr | statutory rate since 2009 |
Who is still paid it
In 2024, 80.3 million hourly-paid workers were covered by the Current Population Survey, the household survey the Bureau of Labor Statistics uses to count minimum-wage workers. Of those, 82,000 earned exactly $7.25 an hour and 760,000 reported earnings below it — a total of 843,000 workers, or 1.0% of the hourly-paid workforce. 's own technical notes caution that earning "below" the federal minimum in this count does not necessarily mean a violation of the law: some of those workers are legally exempt from the federal floor, for instance under provisions that let employers pay tipped workers a lower direct cash wage. Even so, 843,000 people is not a rounding error, and the group skews toward the young: workers under 25 are one-fifth of hourly-paid workers but 43% of those at or below the federal minimum, BLS found — most of them concentrated in food service and other leisure-and-hospitality jobs, the industry with the highest share of workers at the wage floor.
What the floor buys in a year
A full-time, year-round worker paid exactly $7.25 an hour — 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year, 2,080 hours — earns $15,080. That falls below the 2026 federal poverty guideline for a single person, $15,960, set by the Department of Health and Human Services. A full-time minimum-wage income does not clear the poverty line even for one person living alone; for a two-person household, the 2026 guideline is $21,640 — 44% more than a single full-time minimum-wage paycheck covers.
View data as table
| Full-time minimum wage, annual | $15,080 | $7.25/hr x 2,080 hours |
|---|---|---|
| Poverty guideline, 1 person | $15,960 | 2026, HHS/ASPE |
| Poverty guideline, 2 people | $21,640 | 2026, HHS/ASPE |
The federal floor is also no longer the operative wage for most of the country. As of 2024, 30 states and the District of Columbia had minimum wages that exceeded the federal rate — meaning $7.25 now functions as a true floor mainly in the 20 states that never raised their own minimum above it, or that have no state minimum wage at all.
The takeaway
- The rate hasn't moved in 17 years — longer than any previous gap since 1938. The prior record, from 1997 to 2007, lasted just under a decade.
- The dollar figure is flat; its value is not. $7.25 today buys what about $4.66 bought in 2009 terms — or, read the other way, matching 2009's buying power now would take $11.28 an hour, a 35.7% real loss.
- 843,000 hourly workers were still paid at or below $7.25 in 2024, per — concentrated among young workers and in food service and hospitality.
- Full-time minimum wage doesn't clear the federal poverty line for one person, let alone two, under 's own 2026 guidelines.
Figures reflect the most recent official data available as of publication: 's Characteristics of Minimum Wage Workers report covers calendar year 2024; the CPI Inflation Calculator prices in data through May 2026; poverty guidelines are the 2026 edition. State minimum-wage counts and CPS worker estimates come from the same 2024 report.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division, History of Federal Minimum Wage Rates Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, 1938–2009 — the full record of every statutory rate change, used to establish the July 2009 effective date and the length of every gap between increases, including the current 17-year gap and the prior 1997–2007 record. dol.gov/agencies/whd/minimum-wage/history/chart
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Characteristics of Minimum Wage Workers, 2024 (Report 1115, June 2025) — the 80.3 million hourly-paid worker count, the 82,000-at/760,000-below breakdown, the 1.0% share, the under-25 and industry concentration figures, and the 30-states-plus-D.C. count of states with a minimum wage above the federal rate. bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2024/home.htm
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, CPI Inflation Calculator — the official tool used to price $7.25 (July 2009) and $1.60 (February 1968) in May 2026 dollars, yielding the $11.28 and $15.68 equivalents cited above. data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl
- U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, 2026 Poverty Guidelines for the 48 Contiguous States and the District of Columbia — the $15,960 (one person) and $21,640 (two people) poverty thresholds used for comparison against full-time minimum-wage earnings. aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines
Comments
Always open. Logged-in readers can annotate paragraphs in place.
The Fair Labor Standards Act gives Congress, not any agency, the power to set the federal minimum wage. Since it took effect in 1938, that rate has been raised 22 times — most recently in three annual steps ending July 24, 2009, when it reached $7.25 an hour. No increase has followed. The Department of Labor's own history table shows the previous longest gap between increases ran from September 1997 to July 2007 — just under ten years. The current gap is 17 years and still open, with no successor rate enacted. It is the longest stretch without a change since the law began.