Determining Ag Pay Has Become Confusing

Ag wages a big part of input costs for growers, especially the tree fruit industry which is extremely labor-intensive.  But, in case the cost wasn’t bad enough, many say the system to determine farm worker pay has become very challenging and complex.

Kate Tynan, Vice President at the Northwest Horticultural Council, says whether it's piece-rate or hourly, prevailing wage, or AEWR, surveys offer unquantifiable data.

“Some years, we’ll have a survey that comes out and sets one wage for all of the apple harvest, which is not representative of the vast majority of apple harvests," Tynan said.  "Other times, you might have a wage that tries to get down to a granular level of, let's say, color picking a medium-density Gala orchard. Well, is the state workforce agency going to have the same interpretation as the grower on what that means? Who knows?"

This Could Become A Nationwide Issue

And the prevailing wage, Tynan says, has many issues.

“So, there are just a number of glaring issues that have come up as a part of this prevailing wage system that we’ve seen in Washington state, but could occur in any state across the country, and we really believe that needs to be addressed to make sure that this program is sustainable not only now, but into the future,” she said.

Tynan says they had an interesting situation just last year, where the state of Washington released a survey where they initially attempted to set a prevailing wage for pruning trees by the bin; a very unique measurement.

If you have a story idea for the PNW Ag Network, call (509) 547-1618, or e-mail glenn.vaagen@townsquaremedia.com