Minimum wage: Congress stalls, states act

But the issue will be revisited in coming days as the Senate takes up a bill to increase it to $10.10 an hour. And President Obama and congressional Democrats plan to push the issue on the campaign trail ahead of the November mid-term elections.

In the meantime, many states have made moves to raise their own minimum wages over the next year.

Generally, workers covered under the Fair Labor and Standards Act must be paid at least $7.25 an hour if the state’s own minimum wage is set below that level or if there is no state minimum at all.

But that’s not an issue in 21 states plus the District of Columbia, which already have higher minimum wages.

That number will soon grow to 25 states, since lawmakers in Maryland, Minnesota, Delaware and West Virginia have recently approved minimum wage increases.