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Farmworkers & The Law
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Farmwork in NC
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Migrant & Seasonal
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Immigration Status |
H2A
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Wages
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Worker's compensation
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Access
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Housing
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Field Sanitation
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Pesticides
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AWPA
Income and Wage Issues
According to the most recent US Department of Labor survey over half of all individual farmworkers earn less than $7,500 per year and one half of all farmworker
families earn less than $10,000 per year (1).
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average wage rate forNC field workers in 2000 was $6.83 an hour.
The contract wage for H2A workers in that same year was $6.98 an hour, but employers do not have to pay federal payroll taxes for H2A employees. Therefore, costs to
an employer for H2A workers are lower than the average wage earning field worker in 2000 considering the 7.65% payroll contributions employers must make for non H2A
workers. (2)
However, many employers do not report farmworker wages to the federal government and many farmworkers retire or become disabled without the benefits of social
security.
Farmworkers, like growers, are dependent on the weather and crop yields for their incomes. They may work on a piece rate system, earning a fixed amount for every
bucket of they turn in or for every barn they fill with tobacco.
According to the Fair Labor Standards Act, they must earn on average at least the minimum wage, despite the amount of piece work they complete. However, many
minimum wage violations occur where workers are paid strictly by piece rate.
Other farmworkers have been subjected to unscrupulous crewleaders and employers who do not pay workers for time spent traveling between fields, or while they are
waiting in the fields for work to begin. Some of the more egregious violations of wage laws are unlawful deductions from pay checks. Farmworkers who live on
migrant labor camps may be charged large amounts for rent, food or even alcohol and cigarettes. Sometimes these unlawful deductions reduce a worker’s take home pay
well below the minimum wage.
Resources
1. U.S. Department of Labor, National Agricultural Workers Survey (NAWS) 1997-1998, March 2000.
2. U.S. Department of Agriculture, National Agricultural Statistics Service, Farm Labor (November 17, 2000) and calculations by Institute for Southern Studies,
Media Guide to Covering Farmworkers in North Carolina (March, 2001).
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