minimum wage
noun
the lowest wage payable to employees in general or to designated employees as fixed by law or by union agreement.
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minimum wage
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minimum-wage
minimum-wageadjectiveof or relating to a minimum wage.
minimum wage
1 Americannoun
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minimum wages
plural
minimum-wage
2
American
[min-uh-muhm-wayj]
/ ˈmɪn ə məmˈweɪdʒ /
adjective
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of or relating to a minimum wage.
minimum-wage demands.
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paid or earning a minimum wage.
a minimum-wage worker.
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paying a minimum wage.
a minimum-wage job.
minimum wage
British
noun
minimum wage
Cultural
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of minimum wage
First recorded in 1855–60
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Thousands of Bangladeshi garment workers blocked a major highway and clashed with police on Monday, demanding a monthly minimum wage more than double current pay, as protests spread across industrial hubs.
From Barron's ● Nov. 2, 2026
Thousands of Bangladeshi garment workers blocked a major highway and clashed with police on Monday, demanding a monthly minimum wage more than double their current pay, as protests spread across industrial hubs.
From Barron's ● Nov. 2, 2026
Senator Elaine Millar, Minister for Social Security, said she had "decided to accept the forum's recommendations in respect of the main minimum wage and trainee minimum wage rates".
From BBC ● Oct. 29, 2026
Crop pickers were paid less than the federal minimum wage, had no access to toilets, no way to wash their hands, no mandated breaks.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2026
She worked at a fast-food restaurant, rising to assistant manager but never making much more than minimum wage.
From "Class Matters" by The New York Times
Some of Maysville’s oldest families are like Bare and Huddleston, living on hundreds of acres—far away, some neighbors believe, from the minimum-wage gigs and night shifts of working-class life.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 16, 2026
And teens are competing with older workers for similar jobs: People age 25 and over accounted for 56.9% of minimum-wage workers in 2024.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 18, 2026
She was facing a demand to repay £37,000 while supporting herself through her studies in a minimum-wage job.
From BBC ● Apr. 8, 2026
The fast-food industry was a leading employer of minimum-wage workers, so if they could survey restaurants on either side of the border before and after New Jersey’s wage increase, they could gauge the effect.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 19, 2026
There’s $213 left in Molly’s savings account from the minimum-wage job she had last summer scooping ice cream in Bar Harbor.
From "Orphan Train" by Christina Baker Kline
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
