Which country passed the world's first minimum wage laws in 1894?

New Zealand passed the world’s first national minimum wage laws way back in 1894.This minimum wage law covered all businesses and all industries across the entire country.

Australia (specifically, Victoria), was the second jurisdiction in the world to pass minimum wage laws. At first, Victoria’s minimum wage laws only covered certain industries: they only covered six industries that were notorious for paying low wages. By 1904, these minimum wage laws had grown to cover 150 industries. New South Wales and Western Australia had also passed their own minimum wage laws two years earlier in 1902.

Following the “minimum wage experiment” in Australia and New Zealand, other countries began considering enacting minimum wage in their own borders. As a result, the UK passed its own set of minimum wage laws in 1909.

The US established national minimum wage laws in the 1930's. Before the national or federal law, at least 13 US states (between 1912-1920) would pass minimum wage laws which would later be declared unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court.