Opinion ID: 71035
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Nature and degree of control of workers

Text: 29 The first indicator of joint employment status concerns the nature and degree of [the growers'] control of the workers. 29 C.F.R. § 500.20(h)(4)(ii)(A). Such control arises when a grower determines, for example, the number of workers hired for a job, when work should begin on a particular day, which workers should be assigned to specific tasks, and whether a worker should be disciplined or retained. Aimable, 20 F.3d at 441. As noted earlier, the suffer or permit to work/economic dependence standard defines employment in a way that does not depend on the common-law understanding of employment, which was based on limiting concepts of control. See id. at 439. Nevertheless, a grower's control of farmworkers does shed some light on economic dependence. 30 The evidence indicates that the growers exercised control over the farmworkers in several ways. First, the growers told Turke how many farmworkers to bring each day. 12 Second, the growers' foremen, rather than Turke, determined the precise moment when picking would commence each day. Third, the growers were free to directly delay or stop the workers from continuing their work. For example, when new immigration laws that required increased worker documentation went into effect, the growers stopped the harvest to verify that Turke and his workers were in compliance with the laws, and they did not allow work to resume until Turke demonstrated their compliance the following day. 13 Finally, the growers had the ability indirectly to assign work to specific workers. During the 1986-87 season, for example, they moved the pickers from one row to another and from one plot to another by assigning their own tomato-picking crews to pick plots and rows that were being picked by the farmworkers. Compare Griffin & Brand, 471 F.2d at 237-38 (finding that farmer exercised a degree of apparent on-the-job control over workers by tell[ing] the crewleaders at what hour to begin work) with Aimable, 20 F.3d at 440-41 (concluding that contractor had absolute, unfettered, and sole control over farmworkers).