ABLE 9.-MIGRANT WORKERS WITH ONLY FARM EARNINGS WHO WOULD BE ENTITLED TO COMPENSABLE Workers with $720 or more in earnings in 1965 and sufficient unemployment or partial unemployment to receive east 1 benefit payment if coverage were in effect. No adjustment made for the lag-quarter eligibility provision, for filing, or for disqualifications. BLE 10.-WORKERS WITH ONLY FARM EARNINGS WHO WOULD BE ENTITLED TO COMPENSABLE UNEMPLOY- Workers with $720 in earnings in 1965 and sufficient unemployment or partial unemployment to receive at least 1 beneyment, if coverage were in effect. No adjustment made for the lag-quarter eligibility provision, for nonfiling, or for alifications. E 11.—WORKERS WITH ONLY FARM EARNINGS WHO WOULD BE ENTITLED TO COMPENSABLE UNEMPLOY- orkers with $720 in earnings in 1965 and sufficient unemployment or partial unemployment to receive at least 1 t payment, if coverage were in effect. No adjustment made for the lag-period eligibility provision, for nonfiling, or qualifications. TABLE 12.-AVERAGE COST OF BENEFITS PER WORKER INTERVIEWED AND WITH FARM EARNINGS OF $720 OR MORE INTERVIEWED WORKERS WITH ONLY FARM EARNINGS 1 Benefits not adjusted for the lag-period eligibility provision, for nonfiling, or for disqualifications. TABLE 13.-COST OF BENEFITS AS A PERCENTAGE OF FARM WAGES INTERVIEWED WORKERS WITH ONLY Total, unweighted for 1 Benefits not adjusted for the lag-period eligibility provision, for nonfiling, or for disqualifications. 2 Sample cost rates relate benefits based on 1965 farm earnings to total farm earnings in 1965. TABLE 14.-INTERVIEWED WORKERS WITH BOTH FARM AND NONFARM EARNINGS AVERAGE COST OF BENEFITS PER WORKER INTERVIEWED WITH EARNINGS OF $720 OR MORE1 Total benefits, claimants eligible Benefits due to addition of farm earnings Percent on nonfarm earnings earnings due to addition of farm earnings 1 Benefits not adjusted for the lag-period eligibility provision, for nonfiling, or for disqualifications. 2 Total are also adjusted for stratification which inflates those in the $100 to $499 group from the 0.3 percent to the 1.0 percent level. STATEMENT OF JIM HIGHTOWER, COORDINATOR FOR THE FRIENDS OF FARM WORKERS Thank you Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee for this opportunity present the views of Friends of Farm Workers on H.R. 14705. My name is m Hightower, Coordinator for Friends of Farm Workers. (Friends of Farm Workers is a very loose coalition of individuals, located I am concerned with only one issue in the legislation before you. That is the There has been some dialogue with this Committee on the potential cost of As you all know too well, this enormous handout has not gone to those of at need. One journalist, Robert Sherrill, has reported that "about half this ney is pocketed by the farmers who need it least-those in the top 15 percent -ome bracket." Since the 1930's, the federal government has handed billions and billions of lars over to these businessmen in order to take millions and millions of acres of production. Coupled with mechanization (which the federal government o subsidized) this economic policy works directly against the needs of the m worker. Agribusinessmen are paid handsomely to eliminate jobs, but farm rkers are not even granted unemployment compensation. That brings us to this hearing, where this Committee has the chance to take s small step for farm workers. The Secretary of Labor has testified on the ional need and the feasibility of bringing these benefits at least to the workers the largest farms. In the House Ways and Means Committee, Chairman Mills 1 Mr. Byrnes were advocates of covering some farm workers. And none other n Governor Reagan has stood up to say that the states and even the growers the need for extending coverage to farm workers. Allow me to offer another perspective on this issue. It is not enough to coner budget figures and national statistics. To properly consider whether or to extend coverage, it is essential at least to glance at the objective of the ole program—what unemployment compensation might mean to an individual m worker. A 1966 study by the California State Employment Security Agency rs some insight. his study found that if a wide-spread, unemployment compensation program been in effect for farm workers, the average payment could have been $443.75 r 121⁄2 weeks. To a farm worker who suddenly found himself out of a job, t means $35.50 a week for 121⁄2 weeks. Clearly that is not an enormous ount of money-it may even be considered a joke compared to the hundreds housands of dollars that his agribusiness employer received to take land 41-184-70-14 out of production. But it might be enough money to provide the very basics of life, and it might buy enough time to get another job. As I understand it, that is what the unemployment compensation program is all about. It seems a meager public investment for such a vital result. Without unemployment compensation, however, that farm worker and his family are without an interim income. His status changes from temporarily unemployed to desperately impoverished. Thousands of these farm workers are forced to swallow pride and attach themselves to welfare. Thousands more are forced to flee to the alien environments of inner cities-Los Angeles, Denver, El Paso, Chicago, Cleveland, Washington, and other places where they are un-neededed and un-wanted. It is essential that we begin to meet the needs of farm workers where they are. Unemployment compensation is one small program that could begin to help. I notice that the program has paid benefits of $50 billion in its history. I see no credible reason for continuing to exclude farm workers from a program that they clearly need and that clearly is adaptable to their needs. Of all laborers, farm workers suffer most from job insecurity. For these Americans, unemployment compensation is a very real need. It is simple justice that those who pick the crops receive the same coverage granted those who process, deliver, and sell those crops. This organization most strongly urges the Senate Finance Committee to provide unemployment compensation to those who need it most-America's farm workers. Thank you. Senator ANDERSON. Mr. Triggs. STATEMENT OF MATT TRIGGS, ASSISTANT LEGISLATIVE DIREC- a Mr. TRIGGS. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Senator Harris. As you will note from our written statement, although we do have policy on a number of the issues before the committee we have chosen to deal with only one of these issues. This is the one that most witnesses have spoken of this morning in some detail, the coverage of farmworkers. It is our view that the basis of the Secretary's proposal, and I guess that is the proposal before the committee, is impractical and unworkable. In our written statement we present factual data in support of this view. The first point we make is that most farm employment is temporary and casual. In 1968 nearly 70 percent of all the people who worked in agriculture worked less than 75 days for all farm employers. Only 30 percent worked 75 days or more in the year. The surprising thing is that farm employment is becoming even more casual, more temporary, than has been true in the past. In section 2 of our written statement we note that most of the people who work as hired workers in agriculture are not a part of the Nation's regular work force. Two-thirds of them are students, housewives, unemployed persons, or members of farm families working on other farms. Now, this is just not the kind of employees that the unemployment compensation programs were designed to fit. I do not think they do fit. Their inclusion would result in excessive claims. It is the seasonal nature of agriculture, and the character of the employment, that results in the unworkability of the usual approach to unemployment insurance. One of the inherent results of farmworker coverage on the basis proposed by the Secretary, to a work force that for the most part is only casually and temporarily employed, and which consists of people who are not a regular part of the Nation's work force, is that costs of benefits would run extremely high. I would like to read a few paragraphs from our statement on that point. Approximately 70 percent of the farm labor force worked less than 75 days a year and would not have sufficient base employment to be eligible for benefits even if the employers of such workers were covered. Approximately 19 percent of the farm labor force worked 75 to 249 days a year. Virtually all of these workers would be eligible for benefits if employed by covered employers and would draw maximum or close to maximum benefit. By maximum benefits we do not mean necessarily in term of amount. We mean in terms of duration. These are temporary workers. Almost all of them would be eligible for insurance benefits. Approximately 11 percent of the farm labor force works 250 days or more a year. These may properly be termed permanent employees. Even in this case the ratio of benefits to revenues would be high. Tens of thousands of farmers employ a few farmworkers on a 12-month basis, even though they may really need them for only 8 to 10 months during the year. Now, if the economics of the situation are changed so that it is to the mutual advantage of the employer and employee that such employees be laid off in the winter months, it is inevitable that this will occur and become a common practice. In addition, it should be noted that the ratio of benefits to payrolls would be substantially increased by the fact that thousands of workers who now seek farm employment in other States or in other parts of the same State would have substantially less incentive to do so. The only State with meaningful experience that I think would be helpful in an endeavor to understand the impact of extending coverage to farmworkers is North Dakota. The North Dakota unemployment insurance program for farmworkers is voluntary, is administered so as to exclude coverage of seasonal farmworkers. Despite this important exclusion, during the 9 years of the program's operation, benefits have averaged 12.8 percent of taxable payrolls. It would certainly appear reasonable that if seasonal workers were also covered, the ratio of benefits to payrolls would be substantially higher. Now, witnesses have belittled this North Dakota experience. Of course, this experience does not prove very much, except it throws up a caution flag-that maybe we need to know more than has yet been presented about the impact of the extension of the coverage to farmworkers. We suggest that we do need an objective study by a nonpolicymaking organization. Now, there has been some confusion as to what Governor Reagan's position is. This morning Representative Sisk said that the Governor of California has publicly called upon the Congress to enact unemployment legislation covering farmworkers. Well, what does Governor Reagan propose? I am going to read a quotation that was set forth in Secretary Shultz' testimony. According to Secretary Shultz, Governor Reagan said: In this connection I call on Congress to establish legislation in the field of unemployment insurance for year-round farm employment in all States and |