Nebraska labor laws: minimum wage, overtime, leave, final pay and breaks

A second, lower wage for teenagers

The 2026 change most workers have not heard about is a youth rate. From mid-July, an employer may pay $13.50 instead of $15.00 to two groups: workers aged 14 or 15, and new employees aged 16 to 19 during their first 90 days, a training wage that seasonal and migrant workers cannot be paid. Both rates are optional, so an employer can keep paying teenagers the general rate. The difference is $1.50 an hour, or $390 over a 13-week summer job of 20 hours a week. Students in bona fide vocational training can be paid 75 percent of the minimum, a separate exception from the youth and training rates.

The general rate keeps moving. The Department of Labor's updated chart puts it at $15.26 on January 1, 2027, with further steps each January through 2030. For a 40-hour job the 2027 step is worth $541 a year, while the youth rate stays flat for several years.

What the minimum wage raise is worth to you

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Hours per week

h

Next rate in Nebraska

$15.26

Rate on January 1, 2026	$15.00
Rate in force now	$15.00
Extra pay a year since January	$0
Extra pay a year at the next rate	$406

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Sick time under the Healthy Families and Workplaces Act

The 2024 ballot measure gave every worker a right to sick time; a 2025 amendment exempted employers with fewer than 11 employees before the law started on October 1, 2025. Hours accrue at one per 30 worked once you have 80 hours of consecutive employment. How much you can use depends on headcount: 40 hours a year at firms of 11 to 19, and 56 hours at firms of 20 or more. A full-timer accrues about 69 hours over a year, so at a larger employer the 56-hour use limit binds before the accrual does. A 20-hour-a-week worker accrues about 34 hours, under both limits. Workers under 16 and seasonal or temporary farm workers are outside the act.

Sick leave you earn in a year

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Hours per week

h

Hours earned in a year

52

Rate	1 hour per 30 hours worked
Cap (typical employer)	56 hours
Weeks to earn one 8-hour day	8.0

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Overtime only by agreement under state law

Nebraska's Wage Payment and Collection Act lets a worker claim overtime only if the employer agreed to pay it. Everyone else relies on the FLSA, which reaches most employers. A warehouse picker paid $18 who works 45 hours is owed 5 hours at $27 under federal law, $855 for the week. Where the FLSA does not reach a small employer and nothing was agreed, Nebraska law adds no overtime of its own.

Meal periods and the final check

Only mechanical establishments, workshops and assembling plants must give a 30-minute meal break in each 8-hour shift; other employers set their own break policy. When a job ends, final wages are due on the next regular payday or within two weeks, whichever comes first, and earned vacation or PTO is part of that money. Sick hours earned under the 2025 act are not paid out unless the employer folds them into a single PTO bank. The Labor Standards office of the Department of Labor handles unpaid wage questions, and vacation payout rules in other states vary widely.