CA Gov Brown signs bill giving overtime pay to farmworkers

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Monday, September 12, 2016
In this Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2016 file photo, Calif., Gov. Jerry Brown announced that he would sign a pair of environmental bills approved by the Legislature in Sacramento, Calif.
In this Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2016 file photo, Calif., Gov. Jerry Brown announced that he would sign a pair of environmental bills approved by the Legislature in Sacramento, Calif.
AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Farmworkers in the nation's largest agricultural state will be entitled to the same overtime pay as most other hourly workers under a new law signed Monday by California Gov. Jerry Brown.



Brown, a Democrat, announced that he had signed legislation that chips away at a nearly 80-year-old practice of applying separate labor rules to farmhands.



Brown signed the bill following a push by the United Farm Workers union and its allies, who say exempting farmworkers from labor laws is racist and unfair.



RELATED: Gov. Brown extends most ambitious US climate change law



Agricultural groups warn the change will severely harm one of California's largest industries.



The new law will be phased in beginning in 2019.



California employers currently must pay time-and-a half to farmworkers after 10 hours in a day or 60 hours in a week. That's longer than the overtime pay for other workers, who get it after eight hours a day or 40 hours a week.

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