Farm Labor Wage Issues

Changes in regulations that would have allowed employers of H-2 temporary foreign agricultural workers to pay the Federal minimum wage instead of the higher adverse effect wage, would have lowered the estimated 1980 wage bill of H-2 employers by about 19 percent. The U.S. Department of Labor in consultation with the Department of Justice, operates the H-2 temporary foreign worker program. The non-wage costs incurred by employers of H-2 workers, primarily for housing, food, and transportation, was highest at $1,198 per worker on Virginia tobacco farms. Extending minimum wage coverage to all farms and hired farmworkers in the United States would have increased the 1980 farm wage bill by about 3.7 percent