A typical agricultural worker is male, in his 20s or 30s, foreign-born and of Hispanic ethnicity. The demographic data over the last 15 years show the agricultural worker population becoming more established, with one-sixth being migrants in 2013-2014, down from one-half in 1999-2000. Decreases in the proportion of foreign-born and Hispanic agricultural workers also reflect this trend. The population shows signs of aging with the proportion of agricultural workers who were 45 years and older more than doubling over the 15 years of data. During this same time, agricultural workers' educational levels increased with 40 percent reporting at least some high school in 2013-2014.
The majority of agricultural workers continued to report Mexico as their country of birth; however fewer did so in 2013-2014 (68%) compared to 15 years earlier (80%). The proportion of agricultural workers who were U.S. citizens rose 13 percentage points over the 15-year period while the share of U.S.- born agricultural workers rose nine percentage points. This trend was also reflected in agricultural workers' English skills. While the majority of agricultural workers continued to have little or no English language skills, the share that could speak or read English "well" more than doubled over the 15 years of data.
Current status
To view current and trend data from the NAWS select from the links below:
Attention A T users. Data is presented in three formats, a bar chart, a textual data table, and a line chart. The data is best reviewed though the data table when using A T.
Data Table — Current status
| Category | 99-00 | 01-02 | 03-04 | 05-06 | 07-08 | 09-10 | 11-12 | 13-14 | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | # | % | |
| Citizen | 1,372 | 19% | 1,523 | 27% | 1,829 | 30% | 1,002 | 26% | 955 | 33% | 946 | 28% | 797 | 33% | 1,154 | 31% |
| Work authorized | 1,973 | 26% | 1,593 | 21% | 1,546 | 24% | 858 | 22% | 843 | 19% | 839 | 21% | 665 | 19% | 974 | 22% |
| Unauthorized | 3,720 | 55% | 3,290 | 52% | 3,214 | 46% | 1,868 | 53% | 1,868 | 48% | 1,883 | 52% | 1,528 | 48% | 2,074 | 47% |
a Estimates with relative standard errors (RSEs) greater than 30 percent but no more than 50 percent are published but should be used with caution.
b Estimates based on fewer than four responses or with RSEs greater than 50 percent are considered statistically unreliable and are suppressed.