2024 Kentucky Tipped Minimum Wage
The 2024 Kentucky Tipped Minimum Wage is $2.13.
Effective 2024-01-01Source: Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)Verified 2026-08-30
Compared with 2023
Every figure on this page is unchanged from 2023.
| Item | 2023 | 2024 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Minimum cash wage | $2.13 | $2.13 | +$0 (+0.0%) |
Who it applies to
Employers in Kentucky who have tipped employees and the tipped employees themselves
What changed this year, and why
Kentucky's minimum cash wage for tipped employees is $2.13 per hour for 2024. An employer may pay this reduced cash wage to any employee who customarily and regularly receives tips above a monthly threshold, provided that the employee's tips combined with the cash wage equal at least the full minimum wage each week.
Common questions
- What is the minimum cash wage for tipped employees in Kentucky?
- The minimum cash wage is $2.13 per hour. The employer must ensure that the employee's cash wage plus tips received equals at least the full minimum wage each week.
- What qualifies as a tipped employee?
- An employee who customarily and regularly receives a specified threshold amount in tips each month.
- Can an employer take an employee's tips?
- No. An employer may not use an employee's tips toward payment of the minimum wage, and may not require an employee to turn over any gratuity except for amounts required by law.
Every amount on this page is a published figure rather than yours. The Tips needed per hour takes the number you enter and works it out against them, showing which published figure it used.
Who counts as a tipped employee
In Kentucky, you count as a tipped employee if you work in an occupation where you customarily and regularly receive more than $30 a month in tips. This threshold is the gateway to the state's tipped-employee rules. If your tips in any given month stay below $30, your employer must pay you the full minimum wage and may not apply any tip credit. Once you cross that $30 mark on a regular basis, your employer is allowed to pay you the tipped cash wage of $2.13 per hour, provided the tips you actually receive bring your total hourly earnings up to at least the standard minimum wage. The definition focuses on what is customary and regular in your occupation, not on what you happened to earn in a single slow month, so a temporary dip does not necessarily remove your tipped-employee status. Understanding whether you qualify matters because it determines whether the employer can rely on the tip credit at all.
Any employee engaged in an occupation in which more than $30 dollars per month is customarily and regularly received in tips, the employer may pay a minimum of $2.13 per hour if the employer' records can establish for each week where credit is taken, when adding the tips received to wages paid, not less than the minimum wage is received by the employee.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
What a tip credit is, and the cash wage underneath it
In Kentucky, if you are a tipped employee your employer may pay you a direct cash wage of $2.13 per hour and claim a tip credit for the rest. The tip credit is the gap between that cash wage and the standard minimum wage. The employer is only allowed to take the credit if its records show that, for each workweek where it applies the credit, your tips plus the $2.13 hourly wage add up to at least the minimum wage. If your tips in a given week are not enough to bridge the gap, the employer cannot rely on the credit for that week and owes you the shortfall. The tip credit is not a blanket reduction - it is measured week by week, and the employer must be able to document it. This means that in a slow week your employer still has to bring your total pay up to the minimum wage even though it has been paying you only $2.13 per hour in direct wages.
the employer may pay a minimum of $2.13 per hour if the employer' records can establish for each week where credit is taken, when adding the tips received to wages paid, not less than the minimum wage is received by the employee.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
When the tips do not get you to the minimum wage
In Kentucky, your employer must make sure that the tips you actually receive, added to the $2.13 per hour cash wage it pays you, reach at least the standard minimum wage for every workweek where it claims a tip credit. The employer must be able to show this from its records for each individual week. If your tips in a particular week are small enough that the total falls short of the minimum wage, the employer cannot use the tip credit for that week - it must pay you enough in direct wages to cover the gap. In practice, this means the $2.13 cash wage is only a floor when your tips are generous; in a slow week the employer has to make up the difference so that you are not left earning less than the minimum wage. The duty to track this falls on the employer, not on you, and the calculation runs week by week rather than over a month or a pay period.
the employer' records can establish for each week where credit is taken, when adding the tips received to wages paid, not less than the minimum wage is received by the employee.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
The notice an employer owes you before it takes the credit
In Kentucky, your employer must be able to show from its records that for each workweek where it claims a tip credit, adding your tips to the cash wages it paid you produced at least the standard minimum wage. The state does not separately spell out a written-notice checklist the employer must hand you before taking the credit, but it does require the employer to track the math week by week and to keep those records on file. That recordkeeping duty is the practical safeguard: if the employer cannot establish from its records that you received the minimum wage in a given week, it cannot claim the tip credit for that week and owes you the shortfall at the full minimum wage. For tipped workers in Kentucky, this means the employer is on notice - through its own obligation to document - that the $2.13 cash wage is conditional, not automatic, and you have the right to expect that its records genuinely reflect what you earned each week in wages and tips.
the employer' records can establish for each week where credit is taken, when adding the tips received to wages paid, not less than the minimum wage is received by the employee.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
Your employer, your manager and your supervisor may not keep your tips
Kentucky law is clear that no employer may use all or part of any tips or gratuities you receive toward the payment of the minimum wage, and no employer may require you to remit any portion of your tips to it except when doing so is required for withholdings under federal or state law. Your tips belong to you. The employer cannot treat them as its own revenue, apply them to its wage obligations, or demand that you hand them over. The only narrow exception is when the employer is withholding from your tips for a tax or similar obligation that the law itself requires it to withhold. Beyond that, your tips are yours. This rule applies to every tipped employee in Kentucky, whether the employer is a large restaurant chain or a small local business, and it operates independently of the tip credit: even where the employer is allowed to pay the $2.13 cash wage, it still may not take any share of the tips you earn.
No employer shall: • Use all or part of any tips or gratuities received by employees toward the payment of the minimum wage. • Require an employee to remit to the employer any gratuity, or any portion thereof, except for the purpose of withholding amoun ts required by federal or state law.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
Which tip pools you can be made to join
In Kentucky, employees may voluntarily agree among themselves to divide their tips, and when they do, the amounts each person keeps are treated as that individual's own tips. If an employer requires the use of a tip pool, the account holding the pooled tips must be kept separate from the employer's other business records, and the employer must make that account open to the pool's participants. A tip pool in Kentucky is therefore a shared arrangement among employees, not a fund the employer can draw on or conceal. The segregation requirement means the pooled money has to be traceable, and the openness requirement means the participants - not the employer - control what happens to the pool. The rule is aimed at preventing employers from using a tip pool as a way to shift tips away from the workers who earned them. If your employer in Kentucky requires you to participate in a tip pool, it must run the pool transparently and keep the money in its own account, separate from the business's regular funds.
If an employer requires the use of a tip pool, then the account used to hold the tip pool shall be segregated from the employer’s other business records and the employer shall make the account open to the pool’s participants.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
Doing two jobs for one employer
Kentucky law does not specifically address the situation where you perform both tipped and non-tipped work for the same employer in the same job. Under the state's rules, the definition of a tipped employee is someone engaged in an occupation where more than $30 a month is customarily and regularly received in tips. If you spend part of your shift doing tipped work and part doing non-tipped work, Kentucky's framework does not clearly state whether your employer can pay you the $2.13 tipped cash wage for the entire shift or only for the time you are actually performing tipped duties. When state law is silent on this issue, the federal dual-jobs rule may apply: you are a tipped employee only with respect to the time you spend in the tipped occupation, and for any substantial amount of time spent on non-tipped work, your employer must pay you at least the full minimum wage. Workers in Kentucky who split their time between tipped and non-tipped tasks should track what they are doing and when, so they can confirm whether the $2.13 rate is being applied correctly to each type of work.
Any employee engaged in an occupation in which more than $30 dollars per month is customarily and regularly received in tips, the employer may pay a minimum of $2.13 per hour if the employer' records can establish for each week where credit is taken, when adding the tips received to wages paid, not less than the minimum wage is received by the employee.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
How each figure was verified
Each number below was read from a stored copy of the document named beside it, and checked to occur word for word in the quoted sentence. The digest is of that stored text.
Kentucky Wage and Hour Laws (Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet)
- Minimum cash wage
the employer may pay a minimum of $2.13 per hour
Other years
Every Kentucky Tipped Minimum Wage year · Tipped Minimum Wage in every state