Capital Journal reports:
Farmers and ranchers in the Northern Plains hired fewer workers this year than in 2015, and paid them less this October during the key harvest period than they did a year earlier, according to the farm labor report issued on Thursday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture ag statistics office in Lincoln, Nebraska.
The report looked at farmers and ranchers in South Dakota, North Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas and showed that these areas hired 34,000 workers July 10016 this summer, down 8 percent from the same week in 2015.
They kept the same number of workers the week of Oct. 9-15, this year; but that was 15 percent below the 40,000 they hired the same week in 2015.
Comparing July 2016 to July 2015, farmer labor earned more this year and livestock workers earned less, and worked fewer hours.
But the October wages fell this year from last year’s figures, which mostly follows the lower livestock and crop prices in 2016.
CLICK HERE to read more
Pixabay photo: CC0 Public Domain
