Some 21,000 North Dakotans who work for minimum wage are getting a raise today, as federal and state laws kick in to increase their pay from $5.15 an hour to $5.85 an hour.

The minimum wage increase is taking effect two months after the Democratic Congress added the idea to an omnibus funding bill that met approval from President Bush. Among other things, the bill funds operations in Iraq and provides disaster payments to farmers.

It also calls for two more minimum wage increases - an increase up to $6.55 an hour in one year and an increase up to $7.25 an hour in 2009.

With the new minimum wage, employees who work a 40-hour week every week of the year will earn $13,104 annually, compared with $11,536 under the old wage. The federal poverty level for a family of three remains $16,090.

For about 4,000 North Dakota minimum wage workers, the increase will come from a state law instead of a federal law. Those workers are exempt from the federal standard because they're disables, work for very small businesses with no interstate commerce or are in a specifically exempt category such as newspaper workers.

Back in March, Gov. John Hoeven signed a law tying North Dakota's minimum wage to any increase on the federal level. The idea, sponsored by Republicans in the state Legislature, came under fire from Democrats who said North Dakota needed to set its own wage policy in case the federal government failed to act.

Once signed, the law sat on the books for more than two months awaiting action from Washington.

But Don Canton, a spokesman for Hoeven, said today's increase shows that the tie-in was the correct strategy.

"We thought the wage should be raised, but we wanted it to be raised across the board (with other states)," Canton said.

He said keeping North Dakota's wage even with surrounding states is sound business development policy, which can help raise wages on every level.

Jaime Selzler, executive director of the North Dakota Democratic Party, praised today's increase, calling it "a long-overdue raise."

"For the many North Dakotans who are working two or three jobs to pay the bills, this will help raise their standard of living," Selzler. said in a press release.

(Reach reporter Jonathan Rivoli at 223-8482 or jonathan.rivoli@;bismarcktribune.com.)