Dive Brief:
- For the second time in seven years, the Washington, D.C., city council overrode the will of voters and approved a measure that will preserve the tipped subminimum wage in the nation’s capital.
- Rather than pass a full repeal of Initiative 82, the councilmembers voted Monday for an amendment to the law that holds the minimum wage for tipped workers to $10 an hour until July 1, 2026, and then permits gradual increases until 2034, when employers will be required to pay tipped workers 75% of the district’s minimum wage, according to a statement from the National Restaurant Association.
- The move comes less than two months after the council voted to pause wage increases for tipped workers following employer opposition to Initiative 82.
Dive Insight:
Employment data does not suggest that I-82 — which passed with 74% of the vote in a referendum in 2022 and began to phase out the tip credit in May 2023 — had a significant impact on full-service restaurant employment in Washington. Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that through May 2025, full-service restaurant employment on both year-over-year and two-year trailing bases either increased or showed no change.
Full-service sector employment in June 2025 lagged 2024’s numbers by about 400 jobs — though June 2024’s 31,000 figure was the highest monthly figure on record for the District, indicating I-82 was not responsible for an immediate, statistically measurable employment shock.
The District’s economy has instead been impacted by cuts to federal spending, according to Axios. Total employment in Washington fell by 6,000 between June 2024 and June 2025, according to BLS, while the unemployment rate in the District, at 5.9%, is the highest it has been since January 2022.
The National Restaurant Association praised the passage of the amendment preserving a 25% tip credit.
“Today’s vote continues the national bipartisan momentum in support of the tip wage that was highlighted last year when seventeen states and three municipalities rejected efforts to eliminate the tip wage,” Mike Whatley, the NRA’s vice president of state affairs and grassroots advocacy, wrote in a statement emailed to Restaurant Dive.
One Fair Wage, one of the groups that supported I-82, decried the measure as “a direct assault on both economic justice and democratic rule.”
“Instead of honoring the will of the people, Councilmembers sided with a corporate lobby that spreads lies and bankrolls influence. All options are on the table, including referendum and recall, to reinstate One Fair Wage as required by the will of the voters and workers in DC,” Saru Jayaraman, president of OFW, said in a statement.
