H-2B Wage Offers

Limitations

Federal fiscal years (October 1 - September 30), not calendar years: `year` is the fiscal year of DOL's final determination on the application. FY2026 is PARTIAL: decisions through June 30, 2026 only (DOL's Q3 file); do not compare it with complete years. Measured on the complete years FY2020-FY2025, the average over decisions from October through the same end date ran $0.31 to $0.58 above the full-year average every year, so FY2026's partial figure likely reads high by about that much. What the wage is: the basic hourly wage the employer offered for the H-2B job (BASIC_WAGE_RATE_FROM - the bottom of the range where the application offers a range), which must be at least the prevailing wage DOL determined for the occupation and area. It is an offer, not earnings: overtime and hours actually worked are not in it. The average is weighted by positions certified - each application's offer counts once per certified position - and covers every Georgia application DOL certified at least one position on (the positions h2b_certifications counts), except those paid per another unit. Georgia averages: FY2020 $13.05; FY2021 $13.29; FY2022 $13.85; FY2023 $14.85; FY2024 $15.59; FY2025 $16.76; FY2026 $17.82. 34% of the averaged positions (FY2020-FY2026) were offered a range rather than one rate; the average uses the bottom, so it understates what those workers could earn, most where the ranges are widest (position-weighted bottom and top of the ranged offers, largest occupations: landscaping_groundskeeping_workers $15.54-$20.62; forest_conservation_workers $11.51-$25.06). It includes the certifications DOL marks '(Returned)' - returned to DOL unused, most often because the H-2B visa cap was reached, with the job often filed again later - as h2b_certifications and DOL's own totals do (FY2020 399 positions; FY2022 52 positions; FY2023 195 positions; FY2024 88 positions; FY2025 121 positions; FY2026 1,198 positions); a re-filed job's offer can therefore count twice. Excluded: applications whose wage is stated per week, two weeks, month or year - FY2020 5 applications (115 positions); FY2023 1 application (60 positions); FY2024 1 application (15 positions); FY2025 2 applications (19 positions). 4 of them state a genuine weekly wage ($342.00-$393.20 a week); the other 5 (104 positions) state an hourly figure ($8.50-$18.33) under another unit - an evident unit slip - and are excluded rather than reinterpreted. Positions averaged plus positions excluded equal h2b_certifications' Georgia positions certified in every year. An hourly offer below the $7.25 federal minimum wage would be excluded as impossible; none exists. Geography is the application's FIRST worksite, placed exactly as in h2b_certifications (DOL's county, corrected from the geocoded street address where certain, then by the certain-only ZIP rule; blank counties from the address or the ZIP's population-dominant county) - see that topic's limitations for the counts and risks. Every application has a county. `soc_occupation` uses h2b_certifications' five named occupations (the five with the most Georgia positions certified) and 'other'; county rows are totals ('all'). A county or occupation average may rest on a single employer's application - read it with num_applications_with_wage. No suppression: rows are applications, not people, and DOL publishes each offer with the employer's name. An average is NULL only where no certified hourly position exists.