By Jingyuan Zhang and Sushil Paudyal et.al
Finding reliable workers has become increasingly difficult for U.S. farmers, especially for physically demanding agricultural jobs (U.S. Department of Agriculture, 2023). The pool of domestic workers willing to take these jobs continues to shrink, even as wages have increased. In response, many farms have turned to the H-2A program.
Between 2015 and 2024, the number of certified H-2A workers more than doubled, reaching 350,000 or more (Figure 1). These workers now represent a significant share of the agricultural labor force and play an important role in supporting food production.
The program has been, and remains, heavily concentrated on crop agriculture (Escalante, 2023). More than 80% of H-2A workers are employed in crop production, while animal farms make limited use of the program (Figure 2). Although the number of H-2A workers in animal agriculture increased from about 7,500 to over 17,500 since 2015 (Figure 1), they accounted for only 4.7% of total H-2A employment in 2024 (Figure 2). This raises an important question: why is adoption so low among livestock farmers, and how could the program better serve their needs?
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