Opinion ID: 2757983
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Prelude to the Present Litigation

Text: Organizations representing H-2B and United States workers challenged 20 C.F.R. § 655.10(f) and the 2009 Wage Guidance in CATA I. These plaintiffs asserted that the vast majority of H-2B jobs were low-skilled occupations filled by laborers, housekeeping cleaners, and amusement park workers, or persons in similar low-skilled employment, and that the rules recognized artificial skill distinctions that allowed employers to bring foreign workers into the country for employment at wages substantially below the average wage for an occupation, to the detriment of United States workers. 5 DOL republished the 2005 Wage Guidance in November 2009 as the 2009 Wage Guidance. See Employment and Training Administration, Prevailing Wage Determination Policy Guidance, Nonagricultural Immigration Programs (Nov. 2009), A135-70. The 2009 Wage Guidance never was subject to notice and comment. 11 On August 30, 2010, a district court in CATA I held that DOL improperly promulgated the “skill level” 2008 Wage Rule. The court reasoned: In the absence of any valid regulatory language authorizing the use of skill levels in determining the prevailing wage rate . . . the four-tier structure of skill levels set out in the guidance letters— which is entirely untethered from any other statutory or regulatory provisions, and which affirmatively creates the wages paid to H–2B workers—constitutes a legislative rule which must be subjected to notice and comment. It has not been so subjected and it . . . is therefore invalid. 2010 WL 3431761, at . In invalidating the words “at the skill level,” the court stressed that “DOL has never explained its reasoning for using skill levels as part of H-2B prevailing wage determinations” and that the system never has been subject to notice and comment, as the APA requires. Id. at , 25. The district court further found that DOL’s errors in promulgating the 2008 Wage Rule were “serious” and of a magnitude that counseled in favor of vacating the rule. Id. at  (“[W]hile the use of skill levels in 20 C.F.R. § 655.10 is invalid for lack of a rational explanation, DOL’s failure to provide an explanation for using skill levels in the H–2B program constitutes a recurring issue stretching over more than a decade, and DOL was, in the context of the 2009 rulemaking, presented with comments alleging fundamental problems with the use of skill levels in the H–2B program.”). Nonetheless, in 12 view of the circumstance that the court was invalidating the rule due to DOL’s procedural rather than substantive errors, it did not vacate the portion of the 2008 Wage Rule providing for skill-level methodology; instead, the court remanded the case to DOL and ordered it to promulgate a replacement rule within 120 days, pursuant to the APA’s procedures for notice and comment. Id. Pursuant to that order, DOL issued a notice of proposed rulemaking. This notice stated that the 2008 Wage Rule’s skilllevel methodology did not comply with DOL’s regulatory and statutory mandate because the methodology did not produce “the appropriate wage necessary to ensure that U.S. workers are not adversely affected by the employment of H-2B workers.” Wage Methodology for the Temporary Non-Agricultural Employment H-2B Program, 75 Fed. Reg. 61,578-01, 61,579 (Oct. 5, 2010). Following notice and comment, DOL announced a revised prevailing wage rule in January 2011 (“the 2011 Wage Rule”). Wage Methodology for the Temporary Non- Agricultural Employment H-2B Program, 76 Fed. Reg. 34520176 (Jan. 19, 2011). The 2011 Wage Rule prohibits use of private surveys except where an otherwise applicable OES survey does not provide any data for an occupation in a specific geographical location, or where the OES survey does not accurately represent the relevant job classification. Id. at 3467. The 2011 Wage Rule’s preamble explains that the Rule was promulgated in response to findings that the 2008 Wage Rule “artificially lowers . . . wage[s] to a point that [they] no longer represent[ ] market-based wage[s] for the occupation.” Id. at 3477. The preamble concludes: “continuing the current calculation methodology . . . does not provide adequate 13 protections to U.S. and H-2B workers,” violating both the INA and DHS mandates. Id. at 3471, 3477. Though employer associations challenged the 2011 Wage Rule, we upheld the rule in Louisiana Forestry, 745 F.3d 653.