Analyses of data from the 1996 Current Population Survey earnings microdata file examined demographic, earnings, and geographic characteristics of U.S. hired farmworkers. Approximately 906,000 persons aged 15 and older were employed as hired farmworkers each week in 1996, and an additional 72,000 persons were hired as farmworkers as a second job. Hired farmworkers were more likely than all U.S. wage and salary workers to be male, Hispanic, younger, less educated, never married, and non-U.S. citizens. A third reported less than a ninth-grade education, compared with less than four percent of all workers. Between 1990 and 1996, real median earnings increased four percent for hired farmworkers while decreasing four percent for all workers. The first section of this report covers demographic characteristics: gender, age, marital status, racial or ethnic group, citizenship status, education, unemployment, and secondary job holders. Other sections discuss part-time versus full-time employment, distribution of hired farmworkers by geographic region and type of agricultural establishment, and earnings characteristics. Educational attainment data are presented for hired farmworkers; all wage and salary workers; non-citizens; gender and racial/ethnic groups of hired farmworkers; hired farmworkers and all workers by employment status; and hired farmworkers by geographic region and by type of agricultural establishment. Appendices present data on demographic and earnings trends, 1990-96. (Contains 11 references, a glossary,19 tables and 5 figures.) (SV)