Figure 1
Empirical
Section 2 · Historical
H-2A certified positions have become structurally important
Certified positions increased more than eightfold between FY2005 and FY2025 — the program is no longer a niche.
Purpose
Show that H-2A is no longer a niche program.
Question answered
How much has the program grown?
Visual spec
Line chart of positions certified — not visas or distinct workers.
› Notes & caveats
- Selected milestone years are shown rather than every annual observation.
- FY2025 reflects DOL year-end selected statistics.
- A worker may fill more than one certified position; some certified positions do not result in visas.
Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Foreign Labor Certification, annual selected statistics; USDA ERS Farm Labor page. Author calculations as indicated.
Figure 2
Empirical
Section 2
Foreign labor dependence extends beyond H-2A
In 2020–22, 42 percent of hired crop farmworkers surveyed by NAWS lacked work authorization.
Purpose
Prevent treating H-2A as the entire foreign-labor system.
Question answered
Who makes up the hired crop workforce?
Visual spec
Horizontal bars across four legal-status categories.
› Notes & caveats
- NAWS excludes H-2A workers and livestock workers.
- Legal status is difficult to measure and is self-reported in a trusted survey setting.
- The chart is about hired crop farmworkers, not all agricultural workers.
Source: USDA Economic Research Service, based on the Department of Labor National Agricultural Workers Survey.
Figure 3
Empirical
Section 2
H-2A dependence is concentrated geographically
Ten states accounted for roughly two-thirds of FY2022 certified positions; Florida, California & Georgia alone made up 35 percent.
Purpose
Show that national averages conceal state-level dependence.
Question answered
Where are H-2A positions concentrated?
Visual spec
Ranked horizontal bar chart.
› Notes & caveats
- Shares are rounded and therefore do not sum precisely.
- State assignment follows certified job location.
- FY2022 is used because USDA published a clean, comparable state breakdown.
Source: USDA ERS, based on DOL certification data.
Figure 4
Empirical
Section 2 · Implementation
A small share of employers account for most H-2A positions
The largest 5.3 percent of H-2A employers — those certified for 100 or more workers — accounted for more than two-thirds of certified jobs in FY2022. The roughly 115 employers certified for 500 or more workers alone accounted for about 40 percent, even though two-thirds of all employers request fewer than 10.
Purpose
Show program use is highly concentrated.
Question answered
Is H-2A primarily a small-farm program?
Visual spec
Grouped bars across the three ERS-published size bands — share of employers vs. share of certified positions.
› Notes & caveats
- Size bands follow the three categories ERS publishes (1–9, 10–99, 100+ certified positions). The 1–9 and 100+ values are stated directly by ERS; the 10–99 band is the residual and is shown as such.
- Unit is certified positions per employer in FY2022, across roughly 12,200 unique certified employers and about 372,000 certified positions.
- The 500+ tier is a subset of the 100+ band, not a separate bar — it is reported in the caption rather than plotted.
- Employer records include farm labor contractors, who serve multiple farms and skew large; FLCs accounted for about 44 percent of certified positions in FY2022.
- Employer concentration is not the same as farm concentration.
Source: USDA ERS, H-2A Temporary Agricultural Job Certifications Continued To Soar in 2022 (Amber Waves, March 2023); Castillo, Martin & Rutledge, “Whither the H-2A Visa Program: Expansion and Concentration,” Choices 39(1), 2024. Unit: certified positions, FY2022. 10–99 band computed as the residual.
Figure 5
Empirical
Section 3
Fewer farms, larger average operations
The number of farms declined while average farm size rose, especially from 2017 to 2022.
Purpose
Structural context — without claiming labor policy caused consolidation.
Question answered
How has farm structure changed?
Visual spec
Dual-axis line chart across five Census years.
› Notes & caveats
- The federal farm definition includes many very small operations.
- Dual axes can exaggerate visual relationships; no causal relationship is implied.
- Retain Census methodological notes in the technical appendix.
Source: USDA NASS, 2022 Census of Agriculture, U.S. Summary and State Data.
Figure 6
Empirical
Section 3
The producer population is shifting toward retirement age
Between 2017 and 2022, producers ages 35–64 declined 9 percent while producers 65 and older increased 12 percent.
Purpose
Show why succession and adoption capacity matter.
Question answered
How is the age distribution changing?
Visual spec
Grouped bars by age category, in millions of producers.
› Notes & caveats
- Producer counts are not the same as full-time farmers.
- A farm may have multiple producers.
- Decision-maker reporting patterns affect comparisons.
Source: USDA NASS, Farm Producers: 2022 Census of Agriculture Highlights.
Figure 7
Empirical
Section 3
Labor expenses are concentrated in a handful of farm industries
Five industries accounted for 73.6 percent of U.S. farm labor expenses in 2022 — up from 70.7 percent in 2012 and 69.3 percent in 1997.
Purpose
Identify where modernization financing can matter most.
Question answered
Which industries account for farm labor spending?
Visual spec
Ranked horizontal bars.
› Notes & caveats
- Shares are each industry's percentage of total U.S. farm labor expenses ($51.9 billion nominal, 2022), covering both directly hired and contract labor.
- Expense share is not the same as labor intensity. Oilseed and grain ranks third by expense share but has one of the lowest labor-to-sales ratios in agriculture (4.1 percent); fruit and tree nut is highest at 36.0 percent.
- Expense share is also not a proxy for automation potential — dairy's share reflects both scale and consolidation, and grain production is already largely mechanized.
- Industries follow NAICS production-specialty classification: a farm is assigned to an industry when that industry accounts for at least half the value of its production.
Source: USDA ERS, Farm Labor Expenses: Evidence from the 1997–2022 Census of Agriculture Data, Economic Brief No. 47 (September 2025), table 1. Unit: share of total U.S. farm labor expenses, 2022.
Figure 8
Hybrid
Section 2 · End of history
Intent and outcome diverged
Employer sanctions did not eliminate unauthorized farm employment, while the lawful seasonal program expanded dramatically.
The intent · 1986
Employer sanctions were the law's “keystone and major element” — they would remove the incentive for illegal immigration by eliminating the job opportunities drawing unauthorized immigrants to the United States.
President Ronald Reagan, Statement on Signing the Immigration Reform and Control Act, November 6, 1986. Congress separately directed a federal commission to examine whether farm-labor problems were tied to the lack of modern labor-management techniques in agriculture — an insight that never became the organizing principle of policy.
The outcome · 2020s
42%
of hired crop farmworkers surveyed by NAWS still lacked work authorization in 2020–22 — while certified H-2A positions, a separate population NAWS excludes, rose to 398,258 in FY2025.
Purpose
The article's signature intent-vs-outcome visual.
Question answered
Did IRCA's stated theory of change materialize?
Visual spec
Two-panel quotation-and-data figure.
› Notes & caveats
- The signing statement describes employer sanctions as the mechanism for removing the incentive to migrate illegally. It does not state that the seasonal program would remain small, and no such promise is claimed here.
- The two panels measure different populations. NAWS covers hired crop farmworkers and excludes H-2A and livestock workers; the H-2A figure counts certified positions, which are not visas and not distinct workers.
- The outcome data show coexistence, not causation — they do not establish that IRCA caused H-2A growth.
- The commission study requirement is included because it documents that Congress recognized the productivity dimension in 1986, not to suggest a specific policy was promised.
Source: Ronald Reagan, Statement on Signing the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, November 6, 1986; Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, commission study requirement; USDA ERS, Legal Status of Hired Crop Farmworkers (NAWS), 2020–22; U.S. DOL Office of Foreign Labor Certification, H-2A Selected Statistics FY2025.
Figure 9
Conceptual
Section 4 · Lead figure
The modernization bottleneck is often financial, not technological
Large upfront costs, uncertain resale values, seasonal cash flow, and lender unfamiliarity delay adoption of viable technology.
✓
Viable technology existsCommercially available equipment
↓
Large upfront cost
Uncertain resale value
Seasonal cash flow
Lender unfamiliarity
↓
⟳
Adoption is delayedTechnology remains underused despite viability
Purpose
Translate the capital argument into a causal chain.
Question answered
Why does viable technology remain underused?
Visual spec
Editorial flow diagram.
› Notes & caveats
- This is a conceptual model, not a measured decomposition.
- Barrier importance varies by crop, farm size, and technology.
- Avoid saying capital is always the principal barrier.
Source: Editorial synthesis informed by USDA adoption research and agricultural lending literature.
Figure 10
Editorial synthesis
Section 3
Automation readiness varies sharply by task and crop
Monitoring, spraying, and sorting are broadly commercial; delicate fresh-crop harvesting remains uneven and emerging.
Broadly commercial
Emerging
Research stage
Purpose
Preempt claims that automation is universally ready — or universally speculative.
Question answered
Which agricultural functions are ready now?
Visual spec
Ordinal readiness bands — commercial, emerging, research stage. Band widths are editorial judgments, not measured adoption rates.
› Notes & caveats
- This plate is an editorial synthesis. Band widths express relative maturity and are not measured adoption rates, acreage shares, or market penetration.
- Commercial availability does not imply positive farm-level return on investment. Cost, scale, and crop architecture all govern whether an available system is worth buying.
- Readiness varies widely within each row — by crop, cultivar, canopy structure, field conditions, and operation size.
- USDA ARS field evaluation of an apple-harvesting robot reported fruit-detection above 90 percent in tested orchards, with picking success varying substantially by canopy condition — an illustration of why harvest rows are split rather than uniformly rated.
Source: Editorial synthesis informed by USDA ERS, Precision Dairy Farming, Robotic Milking, and Profitability in the United States (ERR-356); USDA ARS, Reducing Labor and Advancing Precision Agriculture Through Automation; and USDA ARS field evaluation of an apple-harvesting robot. Editorial synthesis, not measured data.
Figure 11
Conceptual
Section 5 · Before conclusion
A transition strategy must combine modernization with enforcement
Financing, proven technology, technical assistance, enforcement, performance tests, and a sunset must operate together.
Purpose
Summarize policy principles without introducing detailed program mechanics.
Question answered
What does a credible transition require?
Visual spec
Radial conceptual framework.
› Notes & caveats
- The figure describes principles, not program mechanics.
- It does not imply equal funding or importance for every component.
- The article should explain the disruption risk of enforcement without transition capacity.
Source: Editorial synthesis.