Florida’s new adverse effect wage rate (AEWR) in 2025 is estimated to be $16.23, pending an official notice in the Federal Register by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). This is an increase of approximately 10% from the previous year’s rate of $14.77.
The results of the Farm Labor Survey are used by the DOL to determine the AEWR, an annual list of minimum wages for H-2A agricultural workers by state. The vast majority of commercial citrus grown in Florida is harvested by H-2A workers.
The Farm Labor Survey, conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service, indicated there were 797,000 workers hired directly by farm operators on the nation’s farms and ranches during the week of October 6–12, 2024. That’s up 3% from the October 2023 reference week.
Farm operators nationally paid their hired workers an average gross wage of $19.11 per hour during the October 2024 reference week, up 2% from the October 2023 reference week.
In February 2023, DOL released the final rule regarding the methodology used to determine the hourly AEWR. The rule triggers an AEWR adjustment twice per year.
Two U.S. House of Representatives committee chairs recently sent a letter to the Government Accountability Office asking it to evaluate the effectiveness of the H-2A visa program. The program, widely used in agriculture, allows employers to hire foreign workers only if U.S. workers are unavailable.
“Employers have become increasingly frustrated with the Department of Labor’s (DOL) regulations that make the program unnecessarily difficult to use,” the letter states. Learn more about the letter here.
Source: Florida Fruit & Vegetable Association
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