what are the minimum wages
About the Minimum Wage. The minimum wage is the minimum hourly wage an employer can pay an employee for work. Currently, the federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour (part of the Fair Labor Standards Act) and some states and cities have raised their minimum wage even higher than that. San Francisco, CA, has the highest minimum wage in the country at $10.55 an hour. Employees that earn the minimum wage tend to be young, and work in businesses that keep a few cents of each sales dollar after expenses.