OPINION

National Ag Week: AEWR

 

March 25, 2021



Washington state pays the highest Adverse Effect Wage Rate (AEWR) in the country, $16.34 an hour. The AEWR acts as a de facto minimum wage for the federal H-2A temporary worker visa program. The H-2A program allows farmers and ranchers all over the United States who prove there are not enough local farmworkers present in their state to hire farmworkers from outside the U.S. on a visa to work in the U.S. for up to 10 months during each year.

The H-2A program in Washington state is heavily utilized despite being designed to encourage the hiring of a local workforce first. In 2020, our state’s farms and ranches hired approximately 25,000 farmworkers through the H-2A program and 2021 will be about the same.

Why is the AEWR important? Because any farmer or rancher who employs an H-2A worker must pay all local workers at the same rate. So, despite what labor activists say, at $16.34 an hour, Washington’s farmworkers are among the highest paid in the United States, regardless of where they are hired from.

-Lewison is Initiative on Agriculture Director for the Washington Policy Center.

 
 

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