Come Jan. 1, 2025, the minimum wage in Vermont is going up.

Vermont is required by law to increase minimum wage annually either by 5% or the inflation rate — whichever percentage is lower. In 2025, minimum wage will have risen almost 2.5% from the year before.

The state is one of 21 that are raising the minimum wage in 2025.

What is Vermont’s minimum wage in 2025?

Starting on Jan. 1, 2025, the minimum wage in Vermont will be $14.01

The current minimum wage is $13.67.

What is the federal minimum wage?

The federal minimum wage is $7.25 and is not changing. That’s been the federal minimum wage since 2009.

What state has the highest minimum wage?

While technically not a state, Washington D.C. has the highest minimum wage in the country at $17.50.

Washington state has the next highest at $16.28, and it’s increasing in 2025 to $16.66 per hour.

The third highest is California, which is increasing it’s minimum wage to $16.50 in 2025. Fast food restaurant employers and healthcare facility employers have a higher minimum wage. The minimum wage for fast food workers starts at $20 and for healthcare workers it’s a scale that starts at $18 depending on the type of work.

What states are raising the minimum wage in 2025?

A total of 21 states are raising the minimum wage in 2025. They are Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, Virginia and Washington.

Most of the increases will go into effect on Jan. 1, but some will go into effect on July 1.

SOUTH BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) – Three men are in police custody following a months-long Vermont Drug Task Force investigation.

Police conducted search warrants at the Anchorage Inn in South Burlington following the investigation into the distribution of fentanyl and cocaine in the Chittenden County area. The investigation consisted of several controlled purchases of illegal drugs and resulted in the seizure of fentanyl and cocaine base.

34-year-old Michael Rainey of Bensalem, Pennsylvania was charged with fentanyl trafficking and cocaine possession. 33-year-old Kenneth Wright of Philadelphia was charged with fentanyl trafficking and sale of cocaine. And 36-year-old Rajib Ingram of Philadelphia was charged with two counts of cocaine sale and fentanyl trafficking.

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The Vermont Conversation with David Goodman is a VTDigger podcast that features in-depth interviews on local and national issues with politicians, activists, artists, changemakers and citizens who are making a difference. Listen below, and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify to hear more.

For Noah Dines, life has been an uphill climb. And that is his dream come true.

Dines, a 30 year-old Stowe local, is in the process of setting a new world record for human powered vertical feet skied in one year. The previous record had been 2.5 million feet set in 2016 by Aaron Rice, another Stowe skier. Dines broke Rice’s record in September, then surpassed his original goal of skiing 3 million feet in October, broke 1 million meters — or 3.3 million feet — in early December, and will wrap up the year having skied 3.5 million feet.

Uphill skiing is known as skinning, so named for the strips of material that attach to the bottom of skis that enable skiers to glide uphill without slipping backwards. They used to be made from seal skins, hence the name skinning. Skinning up ski area trails has become a popular form of exercise in recent years, and backcountry skiers also use skins to travel where there are no lifts.

Dines began his uphill skiing quest on New Years Day 2024 just after midnight. He turned on his headlamp, snapped on his lightweight alpine touring skis and quietly skied off into the night up the trails of Stowe Mountain Resort. He has spent this year chasing snow around the world, from Vermont, to Oregon, Colorado, Europe and Chile. He has skied all but about 30 days this year. A typical day has him skiing uphill about 10,000 feet. At Stowe, that means he skis at least five round trip laps per day, often more. He will finish his quest at the end of this month and will be joined in his last days by his father, who has never skied uphill before.

I met up with Noah Dines on December 17 at the base lodge at Spruce Peak at SMR. It was raining, but Dines was still skiing.

“If you bail when it rains all the time, then you’re not getting everything you could,” he said.

Dines explained that his record quest has required “a lot of saying no” to everything from friends’ weddings to having a beer, from which he has abstained. “Your response to anything has to do with, how will this affect my big year?” he said.

Conceding that “the money has definitely been hard,” Dines has supported himself during his year of chasing snow through sponsorships from Fischer Skis, Maloja clothing and Plink electrolyte drinks. He also raised $10,000 through a GoFundMe and has drawn down his savings.

What has a year of living strenuously meant? 

“Friendships. I’ve met so many incredible people. It’s meant learning how to persevere and work harder than I’ve ever worked before. It’s meant seeing beautiful sunsets in Chile. It’s meant cold mornings and crisp Alpine air. In Europe, it’s meant croissants on the side of a mountain. It’s meant more time with friends in Stowe.”

By pursuing a dream, Dines hopes that he can be a model for others. “I have a passion and I pursued it and I’ve pushed myself as hard as I can, and you can too,” he said. “It doesn’t have to be with sports or take a year, but there’s no reason that you can’t set goals and meet them, that you can’t push yourself just because you didn’t grow up doing it.”

What will the million meter man do to start 2025?

“Well first and foremost, I’ll take a little nap, at least for an afternoon.”