Treasury
3-MO 3.83% +1bp 6-MO 3.98% unch 1-YR 4.08% +4bp 2-YR 4.28% +5bp 3-YR 4.34% +4bp 5-YR 4.45% +7bp 7-YR 4.59% +7bp 10-YR 4.75% +7bp 20-YR 5.28% +6bp 30-YR 5.27% +6bp 3-MO 3.83% +1bp 6-MO 3.98% unch 1-YR 4.08% +4bp 2-YR 4.28% +5bp 3-YR 4.34% +4bp 5-YR 4.45% +7bp 7-YR 4.59% +7bp 10-YR 4.75% +7bp 20-YR 5.28% +6bp 30-YR 5.27% +6bp 3-MO 3.83% +1bp 6-MO 3.98% unch 1-YR 4.08% +4bp 2-YR 4.28% +5bp 3-YR 4.34% +4bp 5-YR 4.45% +7bp 7-YR 4.59% +7bp 10-YR 4.75% +7bp 20-YR 5.28% +6bp 30-YR 5.27% +6bp 3-MO 3.83% +1bp 6-MO 3.98% unch 1-YR 4.08% +4bp 2-YR 4.28% +5bp 3-YR 4.34% +4bp 5-YR 4.45% +7bp 7-YR 4.59% +7bp 10-YR 4.75% +7bp 20-YR 5.28% +6bp 30-YR 5.27% +6bp 3-MO 3.83% +1bp 6-MO 3.98% unch 1-YR 4.08% +4bp 2-YR 4.28% +5bp 3-YR 4.34% +4bp 5-YR 4.45% +7bp 7-YR 4.59% +7bp 10-YR 4.75% +7bp 20-YR 5.28% +6bp 30-YR 5.27% +6bp 3-MO 3.83% +1bp 6-MO 3.98% unch 1-YR 4.08% +4bp 2-YR 4.28% +5bp 3-YR 4.34% +4bp 5-YR 4.45% +7bp 7-YR 4.59% +7bp 10-YR 4.75% +7bp 20-YR 5.28% +6bp 30-YR 5.27% +6bp
US Treasury par yield curve · Jul 31 · Source: U.S. Treasury
Sunday, August 2, 2026
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H-2A

Labor has put the average H-2A wage that sizes farm contractor bonds at $15.96, and the notice announcing the new rates contains none of them

Money & World
The Editorial Team ·
A savoy cabbage photographed from directly above and filling the frame, its outer leaves dark green and deeply veined in pale cream, the crimped inner leaves at the centre a much lighter yellow-green, the background black.
Photo: Scott Webb / Pexels

The notice that sets the minimum wage on American farms does not print the wage.

On Friday morning the Employment and Training Administration filed its annual update to the adverse effect wage rates, the floor an employer must offer, advertise and pay to H-2A workers and to Americans doing the same work alongside them. The document explains the method at length. For the rates it points at a spreadsheet on a Labor Department website.

One number is in the text. The average adverse effect wage rate, defined at 20 CFR 655.103(b) as the simple average of the rates for the crop, nursery and greenhouse worker classification, is $15.96. That figure does one job: it sizes the surety bonds H-2A labour contractors have to post.

Two effective dates

The rates take effect the day the notice publishes, which is Monday. Except where they do not. Entities and states covered by the court order in Kansas v. U.S. Department of Labor, decided in the Southern District of Georgia in 2024, get them 14 days later. The split has been running since that injunction and it is why the department's own rate table carries two different December 2024 dates against different states.

The method itself changed last autumn. Rates now come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics wage survey rather than the Agriculture Department's farm labour survey, and they are split into an entry level and an experience level, with a downward adjustment available only where the employer houses the worker free. The wage data underneath is dated May 2025 and was released in May this year.

What the page said on Saturday morning

The page the notice sends employers to was carrying a last-updated date of 20 January 2026 when this was written. Its non-range rates ran from $14.83 in Mississippi and Louisiana to $19.97 in California, all of them stamped December 2024. Its average adverse effect wage rate, the one used for bonds, read $17.74 per hour, effective 1 January 2025.

That is $1.78 above the number filed on Friday. The two are not computed the same way. The new average spans both skill levels under the survey-based method adopted in October, so it takes in entry-level rates that the older figure did not. The notice sets out that definition and does not mention the earlier number at all, which means the department has published a lower average without saying anything about the fall.

The site was also due to go down for maintenance on Saturday between 8 a.m. and noon Eastern.

The document: Employment and Training Administration, Department of Labor, Labor Certification Process for the Temporary Employment of Foreign Workers in Agriculture in the United States: Adverse Effect Wage Rate Updates for Non-Range Occupations, notice, FR document 2026-15673, filed for public inspection on 31 July 2026 at 8:45 a.m. Eastern with a stated publication date of 3 August 2026. The complete public inspection text was downloaded and read here; no fetch-tool summary was relied on. The notice states that adverse effect wage rates 'are the minimum wage rates that must be offered, advertised in recruitment, and paid by employers to H-2A workers and workers in corresponding employment'; that the rates take effect on the date of publication in the Federal Register, except that 'for entities and states subject to the court order in Kansas et al. v. U.S. Dep't of Labor (749 F. Supp. 3d 1363 (S.D. Ga. 2024))' they take effect 14 days after publication; that the methodology is the one established in the interim final rule at 90 FR 47914 of 2 October 2025, using the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey rather than the earlier source; that the methodology sets rates at two skill levels, Skill Level I entry-level and Skill Level II experience-level, with housing adjustments applying only where the employer provides housing at no cost under 20 CFR 655.120(b)(3); that most job opportunities fall within five Standard Occupational Classification codes making up the field and livestock workers (combined) category, namely 45-2041, 45-2091, 45-2092, 45-2093 and 53-7064; that 20 CFR 655.120(b)(4) requires the OFLC Administrator to publish a Federal Register notice at least once each calendar year establishing the rates; that where a statewide figure is not reported the national figure at that skill level applies; and that the rates themselves are published not in the notice but at https://flag.dol.gov/wage-data/adverse-effect-wage-rates as a searchable spreadsheet. On the average, the notice states that 20 CFR 655.103(b) defines the average AEWR as the simple average of the rates applicable to SOC 45-2092, that 'the calculation encompasses the sum of the complete set of applicable AEWRs across both skill levels without any standardized adjustments referenced above divided by the number of AEWRs applicable to SOC 45-2092 included in the published searchable spreadsheet', and that 'the current average AEWR determined under 20 CFR 655.103(b), which is used to calculate the bond amounts required under 20 CFR 655.132(c)(2)(ii), is $15.96'. The underlying wage data is identified in footnote 4 as the OEWS databases dated 15 May 2026, which the notice states 'represent May 2025 estimates'. The agency contact is given as Brian Pasternak, Administrator, Office of Foreign Labor Certification, and the notice is signed by Marek Laco, Acting Assistant Secretary for Employment and Training. Separately, the Department of Labor page the notice points to, https://flag.dol.gov/wage-data/adverse-effect-wage-rates, was retrieved directly here at approximately 6:20 a.m. Eastern on 1 August 2026 and its own text was read rather than summarised. At that time it carried a stated Last Updated date of 20 January 2026; it listed statewide non-range rates under the heading 'Current Adverse Effect Wage Rates (AEWRs)' with effective dates of 16 December 2024 and 30 December 2024, including Alabama $16.08, California $19.97, Florida $16.23, Texas $15.79 and Mississippi $14.83, and marked Alaska, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands as not reported; it stated the range occupation rate as $2,058.31 per month rising to $2,132.41 per month effective 3 February 2026; it stated under the heading 'Average AEWR Applicable to Computation of Surety Bonds' the figure '$17.74 per hour (Effective January 1, 2025)'; it attributed the split effective dates to the preliminary injunction in Kansas, et al. v. U.S. Department of Labor, No. 2:24-cv-00076-LGW-BWC (S.D. Ga., Aug. 26, 2024) against the Farmworker Protection Rule at 89 FR 33898; and it carried a banner stating that the Foreign Labor Application Gateway would undergo routine system maintenance on Saturday 1 August 2026 between 8:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. Eastern. The notice does not compare its $15.96 figure to any earlier figure and offers no explanation of the difference..

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