Why don’t Americans apply for $30,000 a year farm jobs?
October 16, 2017
The Los Angeles Times asked recently why Americans do not apply for $30,000 a year farm jobs. Reporters profiled vineyard managers in Napa and Sonoma counties offering $15 an hour jobs to workers in Stockton, 75 miles away.
There are many reasons why Americans may be reluctant to accept $15 an hour farm jobs in Napa and Sonoma. HUD’s fair market rent for a two bedroom apartment in 2017 is $1,600 a month in Napa and Sonoma counties, so that out-of-area workers must endure lengthy commutes or spend over half of their earnings in rent. A worker employed 160 hours a month at $15 earns $2,400, and may have to spend two-thirds of his income on rent in high-cost wine country.
But the major reason why Americans shun seemingly high wage farm jobs is that these jobs are mostly an illusion. In 2015, some 16,400 California agricultural establishments hired an average 421,300 workers and paid them $12.8 billion, an average $30,300 or almost $15 an hour for a full-time worker.
Full-time worker is the key, since most farm workers do not work full time. California farmers reported 705,000 unique farm workers whose maximum earnings were from agriculture in 2015, and these primary farm workers earned an average $17,400 or 58 percent of what a full-time worker would have earned. Indeed, the largest category of farm workers, the 293,900 workers employed by farm labor contractors, earned an average $9,900 in 2015, only 44 percent of what a full-time FLC worker would have earned. Since the state’s minimum wage was $9 an hour in 2015, many FLC workers averaged about 1,000 hours of work at $10 an hour.
Americans are rightly suspicious of flyers that offer $1,000 a week for part-time work from home, and they should be similarly suspicious of reports of farm jobs that pay an average $30,000 a year. There are some high-wage farm jobs, but most farm workers do not have them.
| Commodity | Primary workers | Earnings ($mil) | Average earnings ($) | Primary/Full-time earnings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ag, Forestry, Fish | 705,000 | 12,288.0 | 17,434 | 58% |
| Crop Prod. | 260,000 | 5,553.9 | 21,467 | 66% |
| Veg & Mel | 48,500 | 1,232.3 | 25,818 | 68% |
| Fruits & Nut | 154,000 | 2,850.0 | 17,008 | 57% |
| Greenhouse | 32,700 | 981.1 | 30,007 | 84% |
| Other crops | 18,000 | 452.1 | 25,117 | 68% |
| Animal Prod. | 32,700 | 983 | 30,061 | 86% |
| Cattle & Ranch | 25,800 | 788.7 | 30,389 | 85% |
| Dairy Cattle | 20,234 | 614,889 | 30,389 | 87% |
| Support Act. Ag | 408,670 | 5,602.3 | 13,709 | 50% |
| Support Crop | 403,000 | 5,440.0 | 13,498 | 50% |
| Soil Prep | 17,900 | 358.4 | 19,971 | 53% |
| Postharvest Crop | 62,310 | 1,549.0 | 24,859 | 65% |
| FLCs | 293,900 | 2903.1 | 9,878 | 44% |
| Farm Mgmt. Ser. | 16,800 | 407.2 | 24,307 | 66% |
| Source: California EDD Primary/full-time earnings is the actual earnings of farm workers whose maximum earnings were in this NAICS divided by the earnings of a hypothetical worker employed 2,080 hours in this NACIS. For example, there were 20,234 workers whose maximum earnings in 2015 were from dairy farms, and they earned an average $30,389, which is 87 percent of the $34,930 that a full-time worker employed 2,080 hours in dairy would have earned. |
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