PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- In Pennsylvania, like most states, there's a separate lower minimum wage for tipped workers like wait staff at restaurants and a higher minimum wage for everyone else.

Gov. Tom Wolf has been trying to change that.

When it comes to their minimum wage, tipped workers at restaurants and bartenders must be paid at least $2.83 an hour. Tips are supposed to get them up to the state's minimum wage of $7.25 an hour.

If tips don't do that, says John Longstreet, president of the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association, "The employer is responsible for bringing them up to the full minimum wage with company proceeds."

"This has been the law since 1977," Longstreet told KDKA money editor Jon Delano on Wednesday.

While Wolf would rather have all workers at the same minimum wage of $12.00 an hour, the Republican Legislature has not gone along. Instead, the governor proposed a set of regulations just approved by the regulatory commission.

"This will protect their tips. It clarifies that the money they earn in tips goes into their pocket and is not diverted in any way to the operational expenses of an employer," says Tom Foley, the deputy policy director at the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry.

Restaurant and bar owners can no longer keep for themselves part of a tip left on a credit card, and the so-called 80-20 rule is clarified so that tipped employees cannot be required to do non-tip work like sweeping floors or painting walls at that very low $2.83 minimum wage.

Another change is that if tipped workers make less than $135 in tips each month, they must be paid the regular minimum wage.

"We've never had an issue where we've had to make up that difference because they've always earned well above what that is," says Dane Marshall, who owns Bob's Diner.

Marshall says customer tips keep her employees' average hourly wage well above the state minimum.

"My servers are good. They're professionals. They're probably around $20 an hour combined with their wages and what their tips are," she says.

Marshall says the generosity of customers in tipping wait staff, especially during this pandemic, really made a difference.

"Back in my day, when people started eating out, 10 percent was a normal tip and then it was 15. Today, 20 is bare minimum. Most people are above 20 percent," says Marshall.

"The restaurant industry was in great distress during the pandemic, particularly in Pennsylvania, and their customers and their friends rose up to help them by being more generous with the tips. I think that's something that may stick around for a while," Longstreet said.

It does depend on where you drink or dine. Twenty percent at a diner is much more affordable than twenty percent at some high-priced restaurant.

Bottom line, these new regulations – which have the support of the state restaurant association – seem to protect servers and their tips without hurting the owners.