What about tipped employees?

Employees who receive tips must still be paid a base wage by their employer of $6.875/hour with tips coming on top of that. If you do not receive enough tips to get a total of $13.75/hour then your employer must pay you the $13.75/hour. Your employer cannot refuse to pay you the $6.88/hour, even if you make more than $13.75/hour in tips.

On January 1st, 2026 the same is true except the dollar amounts at $7.50 as the employer provided base wage and $15/hour as the required total hourly wage.

Key points for tipped employees:

• 2025: Base wage of $6.875/hour, total minimum of $13.75/hour
• 2026: Base wage of $7.50/hour, total minimum of $15.00/hour
• Employers must make up any shortfall if tips don’t reach the full minimum wage
• Employers cannot pay less than the base wage, regardless of tip amount

More details

RSMO 290.500 (3)

” “Employee”, any individual employed by an employer, except that the term “employee” shall not include:

(a) Any individual employed in a bona fide executive, administrative, or professional capacity;

(b) Any individual engaged in the activities of an educational, charitable, religious, or nonprofit organization where the employer-employee relationship does not, in fact, exist or where the services rendered to the organization are on a voluntary basis;

(c) Any individual standing in loco parentis to foster children in their care;

(d) Any individual employed for less than four months in any year in a resident or day camp for children or youth, or any individual employed by an educational conference center operated by an educational, charitable or not-for-profit organization;

(e) Any individual engaged in the activities of an educational organization where employment by the organization is in lieu of the requirement that the individual pay the cost of tuition, housing or other educational fees of the organization or where earnings of the individual employed by the organization are credited toward the payment of the cost of tuition, housing or other educational fees of the organization;

(f) Any individual employed on or about a private residence on an occasional basis for six hours or less on each occasion;

(g) Any handicapped person employed in a sheltered workshop, certified by the department of elementary and secondary education;

(h) Any person employed on a casual basis to provide baby-sitting services;

(i) Any individual employed by an employer subject to the provisions of part A of subtitle IV of title 49, United States Code, 49 U.S.C. §§ 10101 et seq.;

(j) Any individual employed on a casual or intermittent basis as a golf caddy, newsboy, or in a similar occupation;

(k) Any individual whose earnings are derived in whole or in part from sales commissions and whose hours and places of employment are not substantially controlled by the employer;

(l) Any individual who is employed in any government position defined in 29 U.S.C. §§ 203(e)(2)(C)(i)-(ii);

(m) Any individual employed by a retail or service business whose annual gross volume sales made or business done is less than five hundred thousand dollars;

(n) Any individual who is an offender, as defined in section 217.010, who is incarcerated in any correctional facility operated by the department of corrections, including offenders who provide labor or services on the grounds of such correctional facility pursuant to section 217.550;

(o) Any individual described by the provisions of section 29 U.S.C. 213(a) (8);

Text via https://www.moworkerrights.org/minimum-wage/