Hawai'i's minimum wage was increased to $7.25 an hour in January from the previous rate of $6.75.

The wage increase is the first since 1997, when the minimum was raised by 40 cents to $5.15 an hour.

In May, President Bush signed legislation that will increase the minimum wage 70 cents each summer until 2009.

The new federal hourly minimum wage rates for American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands rise 50 cents today.

Under a provision of the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, the minimum rates for the island territories will further increase 50 cents an hour each May until they reach the minimum wage generally applicable in the United States, the U.S. Department of Labor said in a news release issued yesterday in Washington.

The minimum wage rates in American Samoa, a U.S. territory, had been established by special industry committees that met biennially. The hourly rates varied by industry, and had ranged from $3.18 for garment manufacturing employees to $4.59 for stevedoring workers.

The U.S. Commonwealth of the Mariana Islands' hourly minimum wage, which had been set by its government, will increase to $3.55 today.

By comparison, the hourly federal minimum wage for the 50 states was to rise to $5.85 today, and will increase to $6.55 in July 2008 and $7.25 in July 2009.

Some officials in American Samoa, where tuna canneries employ about one-third of the territory's work force, feared the wage hikes will force companies to relocate elsewhere, crippling the local economy.

The second largest tuna cannery in the territory had already announced it will lay off more than 200 workers because of the hike.

The minimum wage law also mandates the Labor Department to conduct a study eight months from now to determine its economic impact on American Samoa.