BURST
Another year, another minimum wage increase for B.C.’s lowest-paid workers.
The B.C. government announced Thursday that the 2026 wage bump, set to take effective June 1, will move the minimum hourly rate from $17.85 to $18.25.
It’s an increase of about 2.2 per cent, calculated based on the province’s average inflation rate last year, which was just over 2.1 per cent. (The new rate gets rounded to the nearest five cents.)
It’s the 11th straight year B.C. has increased the minimum wage, in stark contrast to the years before that.
Beginning in 2001 — when B.C.’s minimum wage was just $8 an hour, the lowest in Canada at the time and the same year the B.C. Liberals ascended to power — there were no minimum wage increases for a decade and just two years when it went up through 2015. That’s when B.C. first indexed the minimum wage to the consumer price index to account for inflation. When former premier John Horgan and the B.C. NDP took power two years later, the policy of indexing to inflation continued. That policy was protected by law in 2024, making it automatic to tie increases to the previous year’s inflation.
“Working people in our province are feeling the pressure of inflation,” said Labour Minister Jennifer Whiteside in a statement announcing the 2026 increase.
Average wage increases in B.C. have far outpaced jumps in the minimum wage. Hourly average wages have grown by over 25 per cent in the past five years, from just over $30 to nearly $38 an hour.
Many of those earning minimum wage are young adults, women and racialized employees working mostly in retail, food services and care industries, according to the Labour Ministry.
The general minimum wage applies to most jobs, while there are special rates for resident caretakers, live-in home support workers and camp leaders, and piece-rate agricultural workers.
B.C. also now tops up the minimum wage for gig workers such as ride-hailing and delivery drivers, and they too will see their minimum wage go up based on inflation in 2026. They’ll now make $21.89 an hour while actively engaged with customers and deliveries.
B.C. now has the highest minimum wage among Canadian provinces, second only to Nunavut at $19.75 an hour. Alberta has the lowest at $15 an hour — unchanged since 2018.
B.C. MINIMUM WAGE 2001-26
Here are the increases to the minimum wage in B.C. since 2001:
• 2001: $8
• 2002: no increase
• 2003: no increase
• 2004: no increase
• 2005: no increase
• 2006: no increase
• 2007: no increase
• 2008: no increase
• 2009: no increase
• 2010: no increase
• 2011: $8 to $8.75, then $9.50
• 2012: $10.25
• 2013: no increase
• 2014: no increase
• 2015: $10.45
• 2016: $10.85
• 2017: $11.35
• 2018: $12.65
• 2019: $13.85
• 2020: $14.60
• 2021: $15.20
• 2022: $15.65
• 2023: $16.75
• 2024: $17.40
• 2025: $17.85
• June 1, 2026: $18.25
— Source: Labour Ministry