Minimum Wage Standard And Overtime Hours

Alaska Minimum Wage* is as follows:

*Except a person employed as a school bus driver, who shall receive at least two times the Alaska minimum wage.

Alaska Statute 23.10.050 - 23.10.150 establishes minimum wages and overtime pay standards for employment subject to its provisions. These standards are generally applicable to all employees, however there are exemptions.

Minimum Wage - An employer shall pay to each employee a minimum wage for hours worked. The minimum wage shall be $10.34 per hour effective Jan. 1, 2021, calculated by multiplying all hours worked in the pay period by $10.34. This is the least amount that can be paid to an employee as wages.

Payment for Overtime - An employer may not employ an employee for a workweek longer than 40 hours or for more than eight hours in a day. Should an employer find it necessary to employ an employee in excess of these standards, compensation for such overtime shall be paid at the rate of one and one-half times the regular rate of pay.

Minimum Wage and Overtime Exemptions - the following are not required to receive minimum wage or overtime under the Alaska Wage and Hour Act:

1. Student learners - Departmental application/approval is required
2. Any individual employed in agriculture
3. Any individual employed in the taking of aquatic life
4. Any individual employed in the hand picking of shrimp
5. Any individual employed in domestic service (including babysitters) in or about a private home
6. Any individual employed by the United States, State or local government (i.e. Political Subdivision)
7. Any individual engaged in the activities of a nonprofit religious, charitable, cemetery, or educational organization or other nonprofit organization where the services are on a voluntary basis
8. Any individual engaged in the delivery of newspapers to the consumer
9. Any individual employed solely as a watchman or caretaker on premises, property or plants not in operation for four months or more
10. Any individual employed in a bona fide executive, professional or administrative capacity as defined by the FLSA or the regulations adopted by those sections, or as an outside salesman or any salesman working on a straight commission basis
11. Any individual employed in the search for placer or hard rock minerals
12. Any individual under 18 years old employed on a part-time basis for not more than 30 hours in any week
13. Employment by a nonprofit educational or child care facility to serve as a parent of children while the children are in residence at the facility if the employment requires residence at the facility and is compensated on a cash basis exclusive of room and board at an annual rate of less than:
    1. $10,000.00 for an unmarried person; or
    2. $15,000.00 for a married couple
14. Any independent cab driver who establishes the driving area and hours, who contracts on a flat rate basis for the use of the cab, cab permit or dispatch service, and who is compensated solely by the customers served
15. Any person who holds a license under AS 08.54 and who is employed by a registered guide or master guide licensed under AS 08.54, for the first 60 work days in which the person is employed by the registered guide or master guide during a calendar year
16. Any individual employed as a computer systems analyst, computer programmer, software engineer, or other similarly skilled worker
17. Any individual who provides emergency medical services on a voluntary basis; serves with a full-time fire department on a voluntary basis; or provides ski patrol services on a voluntary basis
18. A student participating in a University of Alaska practicum described under AS 14.40.065
19. Any individual who is employed by a motor vehicle dealer and whose primary duty is to receive, analyze, or reference requests for service, repair, or analysis of motor vehicles; arrange financing for the sale of motor vehicles and related products and services that are added or included as part of the sale; or solicit, sell, lease, or exchange motor vehicles.

Additional Overtime Exemptions – The requirement for the payment of overtime does not apply with respect to:

1. Any employee of an employer who employs less than 4 employees in the regular course of business
2. Any employee employed in handling, packing, storing, pasteurizing, drying, preparing in their raw or natural state or canning of agricultural or horticultural commodities for market or in making cheese or butter or other dairy products
3. Any employee of an employer engaged in small mining operations where not more than 12 people are employed, as long as an individual is employed not in excess of 12 hours a day or 56 hours a week during a period or periods of not more than 14 workweeks in the aggregate in any calendar year during the mining season
4. Any employee engaged in agriculture
5. Any employee employed in connection with the publication of any weekly, semi-weekly or daily newspaper with a circulation of less than 1,000
6. Any switchboard operator employed in a public telephone exchange which has fewer than 750 stations
7. Any employee engaged in handling telegraphic, telephone or radio messages for the public under an agency or contract arrangements with a telegraph or communications company where the message or communications revenue of such agency does not exceed $500 a month
8. Any employee employed as a seaman
9. Any employee employed in planting or tending trees, cruising or surveying or bucking or felling timber, or in preparing or transporting logs or other forestry products to the mill, processing plant, railroad or other transportation terminal if the total number of employees in such forestry or lumber operation does not exceed 12
10. Any employee employed as an outside buyer of poultry, eggs, cream or milk in their raw or natural state
11. Any casual employees as defined by regulations of the Commissioner of Labor
12. Any employee of a hospital whose employment includes the provision of medical service
13. Any employee who works under a flexible hour work plan that is included as part of a collective bargaining agreement; or any employee who has a written and signed flexible work hour plan agreement with an employer and the written agreement has been approved by and filed with the Department.
14. Any employee employed as a line haul truck driver for a trip that exceeds 100 road miles one way if the compensation system under which the truck driver is paid includes overtime pay for work in excess of 40 hours a week or for more than eight hours a day and the compensation system requires a rate of pay comparable to the rate of pay required by this section
15. Any employee employed as a community health aide by a local or regional health organization
16. Any employee employed as a flat-rate mechanic primarily engaged in the servicing of automobiles, light trucks, and motor homes if: the mechanic has signed a written agreement with the employer that specifies the mechanic's flat hourly rate of pay, is compensated for all hours worked in any capacity for that employer up to and including eight hours a day and 40 hours a week at an hourly rate that is not less than the greater of 75 percent of the flat hourly rate of pay agreed upon by the employer and employee, or twice the state minimum wage, and is compensated for all hours worked in any capacity for that employer in excess of eight hours a day or 40 straight-time hours a week at one and one-half times the rate previously described
17. Any employee who is employed under a voluntary written agreement addressing the trading of work shifts among employees if the employee is employed by an air carrier subject to subchapter II of the Railway Labor Act, including employment as a customer service representative and the trading agreement is: not a flexible work hour plan, is filed with the employee’s employer, and the trading agreement states that the employee is not entitled to receive overtime for any hours worked by the employee when the employee voluntarily works those hours under a shift trading practice under which the employee has the opportunity, in the same or other work weeks, to reduce hours worked by voluntarily offering a shift for trade or reassignment.
18. Any flight crew member (pilot, co-pilot, flight engineer, and flight attendants) employed by an air carrier subject to the Railway Labor Act.

Recordkeeping

An employer shall keep for a period of at least three years all payroll information and records for each employee at the place of his employment.

Inquiries should be made to: Wage and Hour Administration, Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development, 1251 Muldoon Road, Suite 113, Anchorage, AK 99504, (907) 269-4900.