Minimum Wage & Overtime. As of January 1, 2021, the minimum wage in the state of Washington is $13.69 per hour. The Department of Labor and Industries (L&I) calculates the state minimum wage. Washington employers must pay most employees at least the minimum wage for every hour worked. Most employees who work more than 40 hours in a seven-day workweek must be paid overtime. Overtime pay must be at least 1.5 times the employee's regular hourly rate and employees may not waive their right to overtime pay. Employers must pay overtime to eligible workers regardless of employer size. Collective bargaining agreements and employers may provide more generous overtime pay than state law requires. L&I handles worker rights complaints under the Wage Payment Act. Workers may also choose to file a civil action for violations under the Minimum Wage and Wage Payment Acts.
Overtime Exemptions. Although most employees are entitled to overtime pay after working 40 hours in a seven-day workweek, there are specific categories of employees who are not required to receive overtime, such as executive, administrative, and professional employees in some circumstances; casual laborers; certain seasonal employees; workers performing forest protection and fire prevention activities; and most agricultural workers.
Overtime does not apply to individuals working on a farm involved in:
Recent Washington Supreme Court Case. On November 5, 2020, the Washington Supreme Court ruled in Jose Martinez-Cuevas v. DeRuyter Bros. Dairy, Inc., that the current law exempting agricultural workers from overtime pay, as applied to dairy workers, is unconstitutional under the Washington State Constitution (constitution). Specifically, the court held that the stated purpose of the Minimum Wage Act is to protect the health and safety of Washington workers, as required by the constitution, and under it, the agricultural exemption to overtime pay granted an impermissible privilege or immunity to dairy employers not to pay overtime to their workers. The decision did not address whether dairy employers must pay retroactive overtime for work in excess of 40 hours prior to the date of the decision because neither party raised the issue in its statement of grounds for review, therefore, the issue was not properly before the court.
A court is prohibited from awarding retroactive pay in overtime wage claims when doing so would create a substantially inequitable result.
An award of retroactive pay creates a substantially inequitable result in causes of action for overtime pay when:
The inequitable result test applies retroactively and prospectively to all overtime wage claims regardless of when the cause of action arose.
PRO: This bill does not overturn a court decision but does address an issue the court was silent on, whether farmers are liable to pay three years of retroactive overtime. The bill is needed to rectify an unfair situation. This is a matter of fairness. Dairy workers operated under the current laws and interpretations and now they are being told to go back and pay overtime. Farmers were not violating the law, the law changed on them. Dairy farmers are not opposed to paying overtime. If employers have to pay overtime they will be out of business and not hire workers. Farms are being sued to collect overtime wages even though they never violated the laws.
CON: We should let the courts do their job and apply the standards already in place to decide the issue. The agricultural exemption has existed for 60 years and has saved the industry millions of dollars. The bill seeks to grant the same unconstitutional privilege to the industry the court invalidated. This bill will hurt Washington workers. The bill is not limited to exceptional cases and this would allow back-pay in many cases, whether related to agricultural employers or not.
OTHER: This bill also matters in other parts of the business community, not just agriculture.