1205-0017 -Supporting-Statement_5 27 2010

SUPPORTING STATEMENT FOR REQUEST FOR OMB APPROVAL
UNDER THE PAPERWORK REDUCTION ACT OF 1995
TABLE OF CONTENTS

SECTION

PAGE

A. JUSTIFICATION ................................................................................................................................ 2
A.1 CIRCUMSTANCES NECESSITATING DATA COLLECTION ..................................................................... 2
A.2 HOW, BY WHOM, AND FOR WHAT PURPOSE THE INFORMATION IS TO BE USED ............................... 2
A.3 USE OF TECHNOLOGY TO REDUCE BURDEN ....................................................................................... 3
A.4 EFFORTS TO IDENTIFY DUPLICATION ................................................................................................. 3
A.5 METHODS TO MINIMIZE BURDEN ON SMALL BUSINESSES ................................................................. 3
A.6 CONSEQUENCES OF LESS FREQUENT DATA COLLECTION .................................................................. 4
A.7 SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES FOR DATA COLLECTION........................................................................... 4
A.8 FEDERAL REGISTER NOTICE AND CONSULTATION OUTSIDE THE AGENCY ....................................... 4
A.9 PAYMENT OF GIFTS TO RESPONDENTS ............................................................................................... 4
A.10 CONFIDENTIALITY ASSURANCES ...................................................................................................... 4
A.11 ADDITIONAL JUSTIFICATION FOR SENSITIVE QUESTIONS ................................................................ 4
A.12 ESTIMATES OF THE BURDEN OF DATA COLLECTION ........................................................................ 5
A.13 ESTIMATED COST TO RESPONDENTS ................................................................................................ 6
A.14 ESTIMATES OF ANNUALIZED COSTS TO FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.................................................... 6
A.15 CHANGES IN BURDEN ...................................................................................................................... .6
A.16 TABULATION OF PUBLICATION PLANS AND TIME SCHEDULES FOR THE PROJECT ........................... 7
A.17 APPROVAL NOT TO DISPLAY OMB EXPIRATION DATE ................................................................... 7
A.18 EXCEPTIONS TO OMB FORM 83-I..................................................................................................... 7
B. COLLECTION OF INFORMATION EMPLOYING STATISTICAL METHODS.................... 7

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A.

JUSTIFICATION

A.1 Circumstances Necessitating Data Collection
This is a justification for the Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration’s
(DOL-ETA) request for a 3-year extension, without modifications, to the Domestic Agricultural
In-Season Wage Report (OMB control number 1205-0017). The Wagner-Peyser Act, as
amended, specifies at section 3a that “the Secretary [of Labor] shall assist in coordinating the
State public employment services throughout the country and in increasing their usefulness by
developing and prescribing minimum standards of efficiency, assisting them in meeting
problems peculiar to their localities, promoting uniformity in their administrative and statistical
procedure, furnishing and publishing information as to opportunities for employment and other
information of value in the operation of the system.”
Pursuant to the Wagner-Peyser Act, DOL has established regulations at 20 CFR 653.500
covering requirements for the acceptance and handling of intrastate and interstate job clearance
orders seeking workers to perform agricultural or food processing work on a less than year round
basis. Section 653.501 states, in pertinent part, that employers must assure that the “wages and
working conditions are not less than the prevailing wages and working conditions among
similarly employed agricultural workers in the area of intended employment or the applicable
Federal or State minimum wage, whichever is higher.” Also, regulations for the temporary
employment of alien agricultural and logging workers in the United States, (20 CFR, Part 655,
Subparts B and C) under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, require employers to
pay the workers “at least the adverse effect wage rate in effect at the time the work is performed,
the prevailing hourly wage rate, or the legal federal or State minimum wage rate, whichever is
highest.”
The vehicle for establishing the prevailing wage rate is ETA Form 232, The Domestic
Agricultural In-Season Wage Report. This Report contains the prevailing wage finding based on
data collected by the States from employers in a specific crop area using the ETA Form 232A.
A.2 How, by Whom, and For What Purpose the Information is to be Used
Each year, State Workforce Agencies (SWAs) provide the ETA Office of Foreign Labor
Certification (OFLC) with plans for conducting agricultural wage surveys. The plan identifies
(1) the crop and areas to be covered by the survey, (2) the sampling procedures to be used, and
(3) any additional information that may be required by the OFLC. The plan is reviewed and
evaluated by OFLC staff. In the actual survey, information is obtained from a farm employer by
one or more of the following methods: personal interview, mail, e-mail, fax, or telephone
interview. The information obtained is recorded onto Form ETA 232-A, Wage Survey Interview
Record. This record identifies by crop area and crop activity, the wage rates paid, the number of
domestic and foreign workers and data related to productivity, and the hourly earnings of piece
rate workers. The ETA-232-A data is evaluated, summarized, and arrayed onto Form ETA-232

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by the SWA staff. The prevailing wage is then computed and listed at the top of Form ETA-232,
and subject to review and approval by the OFLC.
The prevailing rate is used in implementing the Secretary's regulations on intrastate and interstate
recruitment of farmworkers (20 CFR 653.500 and 655.105). An employer submitting a job order
for workers to an SWA must offer the higher of prevailing wage rate or Federal or State
minimum wage rate for 20 CFR 653 job orders, and the higher of the adverse effect wage rate or
the prevailing wage rate or the legal Federal or State minimum wage rate for 20 CFR 655 job
orders, as determined by the SWA and reviewed by the OFLC, or the order will not be accepted.
Final review of completed Form ETA-232s is conducted by the OFLC in accordance with the
ETA Handbook to ensure uniformity in the operation of the program and the established
agriculture wage rates.
A.3 Use of Technology to Reduce Burden
Along with collecting data by personal visits, mail and telephone, use of e-mails and faxes are
now common methods of collecting information from farm employers. The OFLC has initiated
the electronic transmission of certified prevailing wage surveys to its Atlanta and Chicago
National Processing Centers (NPCs) to expedite the wage determination process. SWAs may
also submit completed ETA Form 232 to the OFLC electronically or via fax. Information
regarding the purpose, data collection procedures, and the actual prevailing wage findings, are
available to the general public (including employers and workers) via the OFLC website at
http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/ and the Agricultural On-line Wage Library.
A.4 Efforts to Identify Duplication
In our continuing efforts to identify duplication, consultations regarding Form ETA-232 have
been held since the implementation of Form ETA-232 in the 1950's on a periodic and ad hoc
basis, with officials and representatives of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Bureau of
Labor Statistics, the Bureau of the Census, State agricultural and farmworker agencies, farm
employers and growers associations, worker organizations and academia. It was noted that
overall wage collection efforts by Federal, State, and non-governmental agencies have steadily
declined and are projected to continue to decline, further decreasing any possibility of
duplication. There is no similar information being collected for prevailing wage determinations
as that done through the ETA Form 232 and Form 232-A. The wage report continues to be
unique, in that it is the only survey conducted for a specific crop or livestock activity, for a
specific wage reporting area for a specific period or point of time during the harvest or work
season.
A.5 Methods to Minimize Burden on Small Businesses
The involvement of small businesses or other small entities for reporting purposes is extremely
limited. Efforts to streamline the information collection and reporting process and to reduce total
employer respondent burden are described above in item A.3, and also apply to any small
businesses responding to the collection effort.

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A.6 Consequences of Less Frequent Data Collection
If the wage information collected in the ETA Form 232 and Form 232-A is not collected on an
annual basis, DOL will be unable to administer the provisions of 20 CFR 653.500 and 20 CFR
655 Subpart B and Subpart C. Since the vast majority of H-2A applications seeking temporary
labor certification for agricultural workers under 20 CFR 653 and 655 occurs on an annual basis,
current prevailing wage data are required each year in order to process the intrastate and
interstate job orders. The use of wage data from earlier surveys results in inaccurate wage
determinations, wage distortions, and potential legal issues from the farmworker advocacy
groups and the employer community.
A.7 Special Circumstances for Data Collection
These data collection efforts do not involve any special circumstances.

A.8 Federal Register Notice and Consultation Outside the Agency
In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the public was given 60 days to
review the Federal Register Notice (Vol 75, No. 44, Pages 10504-10505; March 8, 2010).
No comments were received.
A.9 Payment of Gifts to Respondents
There is no payment to respondents involved with this information collection.
A.10 Confidentiality Assurances
Although State agencies collect data on individual employers using ETA Form 232-A, the ETAOFLC does not receive personally identifiable employer data. The ETA-OFLC receives only
aggregate summary data of all employers responding to a wage report on the ETA Form 232.
A.11 Additional Justification for Sensitive Questions
There are no sensitive questions included in the proposed data collection.

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A.12 Estimates of the Burden of Data Collection
The annual national burden for this information collection has the following two components:
(1) the ETA Form 232-A reporting burden and (2) the ETA Form 232 reporting burden. This
response provides a separate burden for each of the components.
(1). ETA Form 232-A: This report format is completed by the respondent during the actual
prevailing survey and then transferred, along with other respondents in the same area and crop
activity, to the ETA Form 232 in aggregate. All items on the ETA Form 232-A are to be
completed with no change in the format. This form is used to interview the employers and
obtain accurate farm and ranch wage data which are essential to the effective operation of the Job
Service in serving farm and ranch employers and workers. The hourly burden for this report is
based on the actual experience of agricultural employers and remains unchanged from previous
OMB packages. On average, agricultural employers spend approximately 15 minutes, or ¼ hour,
completing information on the ETA Form 232-A (38,805 X .25 hours = 9,701 total burden
hours). The total annual cost of collecting information on the ETA Form 232-A ($260,084) is
based on the average hourly rate of $26.81 for Farm, Ranch, and Other Agricultural Managers
published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2005).
(2). ETA Form 232: The information contained on ETA Form 232 is compiled within two weeks
after the completion of the ETA Form 232-A’s and entered onto the ETA Form 232. All the
items on ETA Form 232 are to be completed with no change in the format. The hourly burden
for this report is based upon the actual experience of State Workforce Agency staff in collecting
the ETA Form 232-A, and aggregate the individual results by area and by crop activity for
reporting to the Department. On average, State Workforce Agency staff spends approximately
11 hours completing, validating, and submitting information on the ETA Form 232 (600 X 11 =
6,600 total burden hours). The total annual cost of collecting information on the ETA Form 232
($214,500) is based on the average hourly rate for state-run programs ($32.50) for employees in
state Unemployment Insurance (UI) agencies in FY2003 (as used for FY2003 UI budget
formulation purposes).

Report Item

Number of
Respondents

Responses
Per Year

Total
Responses

Hours Per
Response

Annual
Burden
Hours

ETA Form 232-A

38,805

1

38,805

.25

9,701

$260,084

50

1

600

11

6,600

$214,500

38,855

1

39,405

11.25

16,301

$474,584

ETA Form 232
TOTALS

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Annual
Cost

A.13 Estimated Cost to Respondents
There is no cost burden associated with this data collection for the respondents.
A.14 Estimates of Annualized Costs to Federal Government
ETA will continue to collect and maintain all aggregate reports through the OFLC. It is
estimated that the OFLC and National Processing Center (NPC) staff spend the following time
each year reviewing state wage reports, updating the Agricultural On-Line Wage Library, and
using wage results in processing H-2A temporary labor certification applications.
GS-Level/Step

Total Staff

Hourly Rate

Total Hours

Total Cost

OFLC Staff:
GS-15/1
GS-14/1
GS-13/1

1
1
1

$44.59
$37.91
$32.08

100
200
720

$4,459
$7,582
$23,098

GS-12/1

4

$30.74

1,2001

$36,888

NPC Staff:

The total estimated annual cost to the Federal government for this data collection is $72,027.
The hourly rate used to calculate cost is the average hourly rate for an employee in the Federal
service (based on 2005 GS locality pay schedules http://www.opm.gov/oca/07tables/.)

A.15 Changes in Burden
The total annual burden hours requested for this collection of information are 16,301 hours and
remain unchanged from the current OMB approved inventory, and #12 of the Supporting
Statements is identical to the previous submission as well. The total responses are up by 600
(from 38,805 to 39,405) in ROCIS because the previously approved ICR submission
inadvertently omitted the SWAs’ monthly ETA-232 reports (a total of 600) from the responses
calculation in ROCIS.
There is a non-substantive change in ETA-232, #4, which does NOT affect burden. That data
field was divided into unit rate and hourly rate to make it easier for the Department to decipher
the data once received. The SWAs have always used #4 to write in both types of data, but it
created more work for Federal staff who had to manually rewrite the information in order to
separate it. Now the SWA will simply put one type of data in one section and the other type in
the other section. This creates no increase in burden on the SWA’s but marginally reduces the
work for Federal staff.

1 This figure reflects the cumulative time spent by four NPC staff members. Each staff member spends
approximately 300 hours each year reviewing state wage reports, updating the Agricultural On-Line Wage Library,
and using wage results in processing H-2A temporary labor certification applications.

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A.16 Tabulation of Publication Plans and Time Schedules for the Project
Product
Wage Survey
Results
(aggregate)

Submission Date
On-going through
the calendar year

Publishing Date
Published throughout the year on the Agricultural
On-Line Wage Library at
http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/aowl.cfm
as SWAs report aggregate data to OFLC

A.17 Approval Not to Display OMB Expiration Date
The expiration date for OMB approval will be displayed. We are not seeking approval to have
this concealed.

A.18 Exceptions to OMB Form 83-I
No exceptions are requested in the “Certification of Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions.”

B. COLLECTION OF INFORMATION EMPLOYING STATISTICAL
METHODS
This data collection does not employ any statistical methods.

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