WINDOW ROCK – Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren and Division of Human Resources Director Reycita Toddy announced May 26 the implementation of a $14.70 per hour wage minimum wage for all Navajo Nation offices.
“Our chapter houses are at the heart of delivering services to the Navajo Nation,” President Buu Nygren said. “Yet many employees continue to try to make a living on a minimum wage of $7.25. No one can do that. That federal minimum rate keeps our families below the poverty line, and that’s wrong.”
The President said a minimum pay raise was long overdue that the Navajo Nation gets its budgets to reflect competitive wages. Without better pay for the Nation’s minimum wage jobs to fill open positions, it will similarly be unable to attract police officers, EMTs, office staff, lawyers, engineers, biologists, accountants and the numerous educated professionals who can move critical projects forward faster and more efficiently.
As soon as he entered office in 2023, President Nygren initiated the Navajo Nation Compensation Study. The Division of Human Resources contracted REDW, a nationally recognized compensation consulting firm. REDW completed the compensation study in January 2025.
REDW compared Navajo Nation positions with comparable local and regional market positions to ensure competitive salaries, address pay inequities and to improve recruitment and employee retention. Its objective was to analyze data to make the Navajo Nation a leading employer for Navajo Nation workers and professionals.
“More than 1,200 personnel action forms have already been processed under the new salary schedules,” Director Toddy said. “For years, our employees voiced serious and often emotional concerns about low their pay was. My staff deals with the daily difficulty of retaining qualified workers. They’re the first to tell me that the wages we pay our people needs to reflect increased costs of everything we all buy.”
The study is the first step to address income inequalities for Navajo Nation residents who are now facing disproportionately higher gas and diesel prices at the pump, inflated food costs at the supermarket, and higher bills for everything because of their remote locations.
“My administration made this promise to the Navajo people,” President Nygren said. “They remember me saying we had to ensure there would be a wage increase to pay for grandma’s medicine, so moms and dads could feed their families and buy clothes for their kids, and that they could have just enough left over to continue their traditional lives of farming and ranching, which costs so much more today.”
This is the first step of a continuing process, the President said. Next, he and Director Toddy will work to raise wages across the Navajo Nation, and to increase compensation for Navajo Nation retirees.
