Items Tagged with 'Adverse Effect Wage Rates'

The Department of Labor (DOL) is publishing today its 2022 Adverse Effect Wage Rates (AEWR), which are the minimum an employer must pay H-2A nonimmigrant agricultural workers, and proposing some changes to how those rates are set for certain jobs.

Following a failed attempt by the Trump administration to freeze farmworker wages for two years, the Labor Department is proposing to go back to setting minimum wage rates for foreign workers the same way it had been for 30 years.

A federal judge orders USDA to continue collecting farmworker wage data, agreeing with farm labor groups that challenged the suspension of the survey that is used to set minimum wage requirements for H-2A workers.

Farmworker wages under the H-2A program will rise 6% nationally in 2020 to an average of $13.99 an hour, with farmers in some states seeing increases of up to 10%, the Labor Department says.