Arizona growers race against the clock to find winter harvest workers

[aggiesal]

By Daniel González, The Arizona Republic
YUMA, Ariz. — C.R. Waters practically lives in his pickup now that harvest season has begun for the winter vegetable capital of the USA.

As the farm manager for a major vegetable distributor, he makes sure everything from iceberg lettuce to broccoli is ready to pick at precise times.

Good weather has created ideal growing conditions, but Waters is worried that when the vegetables are ready, there won't be enough laborers to get crops out of the fields to market.

Waters, president of the Yuma Fresh Vegetable Association, said it will take 30,000 seasonal workers to harvest the sea of winter vegetables grown in Yuma County, where the fruit and vegetable crop was valued at $745 million in 2004. The area produces 90% of the winter vegetables consumed in the USA and Canada, and 98% of the iceberg lettuce, according to the Arizona office of the National Agricultural Statistics Service, a part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

If growers can't find enough workers, some crops may go unpicked. That could increase prices at the supermarket, and create substantial financial losses for farmers.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-11-20-winter-harvest_x.htm


"I told you so ..." doesn't even begin to cover this

[dipsydoodle]

1. I think you need to change the title

to : Arizona growers race against the clock to find winter harvest workers. That's to help prevent duplicate posts on the same subject. :)

[aggiesal]

19. Sorry. It has been updated.

[mcscajun]

2. aggiesal - Please change your title

From the posting rules for Latest Breaking News:
4. When posting articles, always use the published title of the article as the title of the discussion thread. Additional information may be included in a thread title (in parentheses) if it helps to make the title more clear.

Thanks!

[aggiesal]

20. My Bad. It has been updated.

[MADem]

3. Many growers say the long-term solution is an expanded "guest worker" program for agriculture.

Why not?? I mean, really.

Unless and until some rocket scientists invent a lettuce-picking robot, what's the other option? It's a crime that in a world where people go to bed hungry, that food will rot on the vine.

Eh....it's a crazy world we live in.

[pitohui]

9. iceberg lettuce is not food

this "food" has no calories worth mentioning, if you picked every bit of this "food" and fed it to a starving man, he would die in short order

this argument is not about food, it's about bringing in slaves to undercut wages

because the well to do land owner needs him his slaves :eyes:

[MADem]

11. Well, he isn't producing JUST iceberg lettuce. If you read the article, it says

The area produces 90% of the winter vegetables consumed in the USA and Canada, and 98% of the iceberg lettuce...

Iceberg lettuce is a conveyor of salad dressing and a bit of roughage. Broccoli, carrots, squash and other veggies do have nutrition, and they grow most of them.

This argument IS about food. I don't see Americans lining up to do that work. It's ghastly-hard.

[dogfacedboy]

41. People don't mind hard work as much as they do wage slavery.

I have had manual labor jobs that involved back-breaking work. I would have never taken these jobs had the pay not been acceptable. When the farmers decide to pay decent wages, locals will be willing to pick the crops.

It's amazing that the same people who want super-cheap laborers from Mexico are the same nitwits who call themselves "Minutemen"(c'mon guys! Let's play army!), and send a message to said super-cheap laborers that they are not wanted here.

[MADem]

60. I don't pretend to be an expert on the economies of winter vegetable farming

All I know is that this issue keeps cropping up. Either we need a guest worker program, or we need increased wages, or we need some rocket scientist to automate the process. Quite frankly, I don't give a shit which choice they make, but they need to do something. If Mexican workers can come over the border for the harvest and be returned with a paycheck that helps their economic situation, great. If the farmers can afford to pay wages sufficient to attract US citizens to these backbreaking jobs, well, that's swell too. If they can invent a robot that picks broccoli, gosh a rooney!!!

These arguments that "If they just paid forty bucks an hour" look pretty much like pipe dreams. That ain't gonna happen anytime soon, if you use prevailing wages and the slow growth of the sector as a guide. http://www.jobbankusa.com/career_employment/agricultural_workers/salary_wages_pay.html

Median hourly earnings of the more numerous farmworkers in crops, nurseries, and greenhouses were $7.24 in 2002. The middle 50 percent earned between $6.85 and $8.37 an hour, while the lowest 10 percent earned less than $6.24 and the highest 10 percent earned more than $10.32.

Median hourly earnings for farmworkers who work with livestock were $8.22. The middle 50 percent earned between $6.98 and $10.32 an hour, while the lowest 10 percent earned less than $6.27 and the highest 10 percent earned more than $13.01.

Median hourly earnings of graders and sorters of agricultural products were $7.67 in 2002. The middle 50 percent earned between $6.88 and $9.30. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $6.22, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $11.80.

Median hourly earnings of agricultural inspectors were $13.76 in 2002. The middle 50 percent earned between $10.44 and $18.79. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $9.10, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $23.94...........Few agricultural workers are members of unions.

http://www.jobbankusa.com/career_employment/agricultural_workers/jobs_outlook.html

Overall employment of agricultural workers is projected to grow more slowly than the average for all occupations over the 2002–12 period, primarily reflecting the outlook for farmworkers, who make up the large majority of all agricultural workers. Low wages, the physical demands of the work, and high job turnover should result in abundant job opportunities, however.

Continued consolidation of farms and technological advancements in farm equipment will dampen employment growth. Nevertheless, those farms remaining in operation will still need workers to help with their operations, and farm labor contractors’ employment of farmworkers is expected to increase steadily. Nursery and greenhouse workers should have the most rapid job growth, reflecting the increasing demand for landscaping services.

Slower-than-average employment growth also is anticipated for agricultural inspectors. Governments at all levels are not expected to hire significant numbers of new inspectors, choosing to leave more of the routine inspection to businesses. Slower-than-average growth also is expected for graders and sorters, and agricultural equipment operators, reflecting the agriculture industry’s continuing ability to produce more with fewer workers.

[Vincardog]

47. Where are you expecting UN American workers to come from?

Mexico? North AMERICA.
Guatemala? Central AMERICA
Peru? South AMERICA

AMericans will do the work, It would help if it paid a living wage.

[MADem]

58. Oh, please, you're splitting hairs. Of COURSE most in this hemisphere are "American"

But not all--those Jamaicans picking apples in Vermont, for example. The term was meant, in the context provided, to describe those with "US of" in front of the label, and you do know that (but way to make a lame point not germane to the discussion at hand).

Frankly, if you ask a pissed off Mexican or Canadian if they are "American" they'll tell you not only no, but hell no.

[UncleSepp]

Americans DO this kind of work

My nephew and his friends often work the beet harvest. Some of his friends, he only sees during the beet harvest, because they follow the agricultural work. The ones who live near where the beets are grown host the ones who are coming from out of town. Every one of them is a born-in-the-USA American, and even though it isn't the point, I'll add that they are all white and all speak English as their native language.

This isn't intended as a slam on you at all - it's just that this idea that "Americans won't do this work" is often repeated, but isn't really true. I think it's more of a distribution problem. There aren't enough Americans at the same time in the same area to bring in all the crops - the same kids who bring in the North Dakota harvest may travel through the Midwest for work, but if they tried to travel to California to work the harvest there, they'd spend all their money getting there and back and trying to live in California long enough to get the crops in. The people who travel for the work are going to have to have some way to get there and some way to stay there, and they'll have to know where to go and who to contact for the work.

[MADem]

59. Hmmm. Well, either there aren't enough of them....

Or, as you say, there isn't a "distribution" of Americans in the growing regions who are available to do the work. Otherwise, it wouldn't be a continuous issue, brought up again and again and again.

I don't claim to have the doggone answers, but it's plain that this isn't a "made up" problem. Something has to give--either a guest worker solution, or a wage solution.

This isn't just a lettuce thing. Many of us do like those winter vegetables!

[Kickin_Donkey]

70. But what kinds of work are your nephew and his friends doing?

"Harvest" work consists of different types of work.

Some of it involves driving the various types of equipment: harvesters; forklifts; field wagons; water trucks; the trucks that bring the crops to the processing plant. This category is what American blue-collar workers can do and expect to do. These jobs, at least in the West, are invariably filled by whites or senior Hispanics who are full-time residents (or citizens) of the U.S. and who speak English.

Then there's the other type of work involved in harvest, the grunt work: the people who actually stand on the ladders picking fruit from trees, or walk the rows and pick grapes off the vine, stoop and pick the strawberries or bell peppers by hand -- under the sun for rows that can stretch for miles. Or they're stationed on harvesters manning conveyers belts for mind-numbing hours on end. These jobs are INVARIABLY done by Mexican migrants.

So there is a division of labor, and it's largely segregated by race. I doubt that the white Americans you refer to are actually doing the picking -- pulling the beets out of the ground or manning a conveyor belt with beets going by. Most likely they are driving forklifts and trucks such.

There's harvest work and there's harvest work. Harvesting wheat in Nebraska by driving climate-controlled, CD player-equipped closed-cab combine is not the same as pulling a mile-long row of carrots under a 95-degree sun. They don't even compare.

I think very few Americans would do the latter at any price. This isn't a knock on your nephew or Americans; it's just reality.

[treestar]

13. Buying and selling this non-food does go up a chain though

Some American further up is going to lose a job due to the cut in economic activity.

Lettuce is not picked, there is less of it to truck, sell, everything.

Even Mexicans not here do not buy what they would have bought to eat, etc., and for every so many of them, one American who works on that part of commerce will be out a job.

[MADem]

22. No one, apparently, is reading the actual article. It's not JUST lettuce

It's ninety percent of ALL the winter veggies consumed in the US and Canada. This IS a problem.

[RebelOne]

15. Nutritional values of lettuce

A starving man would not die if he ate it, as it does have some calories.

Lettuce (Iceberg) 1/2 head
Calories 45, Carb 9gm, Fiber 3gm, Protein 3gm, Potassium 350gm, Sodium 30gm, Vit A 10%, Vit B 20%, Calciuim 6%, Iron 6%

Lettuce (Boston, Bibb, Butter) 1 head
Calories 20, Carb 4gm, Fiber 2gm, Protein 2 gm, Potassium 420gm, Sodium 10gm, Vit A 30%, Vit B 20%, Calcium 6%, Iron 2%

Lettuce, Red or Green Leaf, 100 g.
Calories 20, Carb 4gm, Fiber 2gm, Protein 1gm, Potassium 260gm, Sodium 10gm, Vit A 40%, Vit B 30%, Calcium 6%, Iron 8%

Lettuce (Romaine) 100 g. inner leaf
Calories 15, Carb 2gm, Fiber 2gm, Protein 2gm, Potassium 290gm, Sodium 10gm, Vit A 50%, Vit B 40%, Calcium 4%, Iron 6%

[MADem]

24. And it AIN'T just lettuce, either. It's 90% of all winter veggies consumed in US/Canada

...AND, in addition, 98 percent of the iceberg lettuce. This IS a problem. Unless we want to do without or pay through the roof for vegetables in the winter.

[MrPrax]

32. If you notice...

either way the farmers are covered. They get paid MORE if they don't find workers and they get paid their 'normal' rate if they do find workers.

Missing of course is that this industry like many others are facing competition and a changed economic landscape where wages must rise -- but they are bound and determined, like the auto industry, the media industry, to keep thinking it's 1973 and use the 'inflation' scare to compel a less than 'free market' solution to the problem.

[Thor_MN]

53. The farmer that finds workers get paid more, the farmer that doesn't get paid nothing..

If farmer A winds up letting his crops rot in the field, he doesn't get paid anything for those crops. Farmer B down the road, who happened to be able to get enough laborers, gets a better price for his crops, at Farmer A's (and everyone who buys the crop's) expense.

[Kickin_Donkey]

71. In the scenario given in the OP ...

it's not likely that farmer X would get 100% of his crops harvested because he was good at finding laborers, and farmer Y would get 0% of his crops harvested because he didn't find any workers. More likely, given a labor shortage, farmer X might get, to pick a number, 85% of his crops harvested, while farmer Y would get 65% harvested. It's not black and white. Both farmers would get SOME of their crops harvested.

I think the poster you responded to was saying that farmers have their asses covered because commodity prices would go up for the portion of the crop they were able to harvest, due to a drop in supply. You didn't necessarily disagree with his premise, noting that farmer B would get a better price for his crops should farmer A not harvest any.

In reality, both farmers would be in danger of going bankrupt because proifit margins are extremely low for independent family farmers. There are extremely high capital costs -- you need to take out massive loans not only to buy the land and equipement but also to cover seasonal operating costs like fertilizer and fuel. A slight rise in commodity prices would probably not be enough to offset losing a percentage of your harvest. Thus, farmers are highly leveraged, and any loss of crop could have catastrophic consequences.

[jpak]

36. Iceberg lettuce does have nutritional value

http://nutrition.about.com/od/askyournutritionist/f/lettuce_info.htm

<snip>

One cup of iceberg lettuce has 8 calories, 0.5 gram protein, 0.7 gram fiber, 10 mg calcium, 78 mg potassium, 1.5 mg vitamin C, 16 mcg folate, 13.3 mcg of vitamin K, 164 mcg beta carotene and 152 mcg of lutein + zeaxanthin.

<snip>

Feed a starving man bread and water and he would eventually die of scurvy or other malnutrition syndromes...

[zelda7743]

57. Ummm...

A starving man would die in short order if only given ANY kind of vegetable, seeing how humans lack the cellulase enzyme.

[all.of.me]

69. there are definitely more nutritional types of salad greens to grow!

if you're going to take the time and effort to grow greens, iceberg should be at the bottom of the list. there is romaine, red leaf, green leaf, butterhead, and of course mesclun, which is also way more lucrative at $6 a pound!

[zreosumgame]

12. another option is

pay better then slave/peon wages. And perhaps treat those 'migrants' better then you treat a rabid dog and you might not NEED them to cross a border to help his sorry ass.

[MADem]

26. I'm not going to get into hating the farmer, sorry. We don't know how much

he pays, we don't know anything beyond the fact that he can't get workers. We don't know if he is a nice guy, a meanie, or what.

Most farmers I have known are pretty decent folk, actually. There's a level of patience required to raise crops for market.

If a guest worker program works, we should do it. That's how apples get picked in some places in Vermont--Jamaicans come and do it, and then go home. That's how dishes get washed on Cape Cod in the summer, too. Guest workers aren't new. We should treat them well, pay them fairly, and give them decent working conditions. Americans aren't terribly fond of that backbreaking work, and I can understand why--it sucks, it's painful.

I'd imagine guest workers aren't loving it either, but it beats no job at all and it works when you lack language skills to do other things.

[zreosumgame]

46. Ok, you don't live in the wine country so you may not be aware of the conditions

[MADem]

61. Well, I used to live in wine country, but the article is talking about a broccoli farmer in AZ

not Napa Valley, CA. My remarks were specifically in regard to that gentleman who has fields of winter vegetables in AZ that need to be harvested.

And in general, I'm NOT going to hate farmers, or grape growers, or what-have-you. It's stupid, it's pointless, and it is counterproductive. I'm not about to grow my own vegetables, with the exception of my vanity farming in the summer months, unless I abso-fucking-lutely have to. I'm too old for that shit.

If people need to be educated, or need to find a way to make their businesses viable while paying a fair wage, well, fine. That's something that can be worked on. But I doubt these guys wake up in the morning with a goal of "putting down the little guy." They may be a bit selfish or greedy, but there's a fine line between supply and demand. If they take it too far, they'll only screw themselves.

[savemefromdumbya]

4. have to import some workers from England from the areas of high unemployment?

:shrug:

[dipsydoodle]

23. Some of them might well take you up on that

assuming you're going to sort the green cards for them. :)

Joking aside - I knew a German guy years ago who was captured WW2 in France when he 16 years old. As a prisoner of war he spent some time in the USA cotton picking ! Maybe Dubya would agree to putting the Gitmo crowd out on work parties :rofl:

[pitohui]

5. my heart bleeds

it was ever thus, there is always an argument about why we need slavery

pay the people a decent wage such that legal citizens will do the work and hell i'll pick the damn lettuce myself!

but they don't care to do that, do they?

lettuce iceberg is a "vegetable" of absolutely zero nutritional valuable, it is water wrapped in fiber without taste, it is a scar on our environment that it is eaten and produced at a high cost to our aquifers and environment yet it serves no nutritional purpose, however, if people want to continue to produce this luxury crop, it's fairly simple, pay the damn pickers what you need to pay 'em or stop whining

[truedelphi]

8. I agree with you.

THe growers pay the migrants little in the term of wages - but the real costs get passed on to the taxpayers who have to subsidize the housing, food stamps, health needs etc.

[treestar]

14. A higher cost of lettuce will also get passed on

It doesn't work just one way.

[MADem]

28. It's not just lettuce, though.

It is most of the winter veggies eaten in the US and Canada.

[savemefromdumbya]

35. outsourcing the lettuce

I guess the farmer could grow his lettuce in Mexico?

[Kickin_Donkey]

72. That's already being done ...

Most, if not all, of the vegetable crops grown in Arizona are being grown right across the border in much the same manner.

This is depressing the prices of vegetables in the United States, handicapping the U.S. farmer.

It's a complicated situation.

[0007]

54. That's what they said when Cesar Chavez organized the farm workers.

[Democrats_win]

10. They should stop whining and look for solutions.

Several have already been mentioned. They could even request help from high schoolers if it's that bad. This could be a community effort which would be really positive.

[Norquist Nemesis]

6. "If growers can't find enough workers"

Why in the world wouldn't they be able to find enough workers? :sarcasm:

It sounds like a veiled threat: Let me hire who I want for the price I want or you'll pay!

[treestar]

16. As far as capitalism is concerned, you will

We can't just dictate the market price of that labor. If with all the restrictions the US government imposes, the outfit can't pay for its operations, then it will go out of business. Maybe it ought to be able to keep functioning. It may stil contribute to the economy.

[Norquist Nemesis]

25. FWIW, this is the danger in control by large corporations

I'd like to see some statistics on the profit margins for these companies. The majority of them are part of (or contracted to sell to) major corporations and conglomerates. Like you said, if they can't pay for its operations then it goes out of business. There are the other operating factors such as rising transporation costs, for example.

But they aren't even on the same page. The corporations are working on implementation of the 5-10 year plans, while the indys are working on one to two year plans. *sigh* Law of demand. Looks like we're screwed.

[neoblues]

7. It may be difficult...

but if it's economically viable to pick the produce for market, it will get picked. They may have to find new ways to recruit people to pick their produce and pay them enough to make it worth their while, and they consequently may have to raise it's market price... Nevertheless, complaining that they can't find enough pickers if they've been depending upon illegal immigrants, and if so, almost surely failing to pay them fairly, then I don't have much sympathy.

If it's worth doing, they will find the laborers--and pay them whatever it takes. If they are trying to resolve their problems politically by scaring the shopping public that they'll face higher prices, so be it. If they're just telling us of their woes and why they're going to have to raise prices, again, thanks for the explanation.

[buddysmellgood]

49. Yes. Thank you. Very rational. Want vegetables? Buy them. Too expensive? Grow your own.

[NashVegas]

64. Don't Forget: Learn Canning Methods

Not a bad skill to have, that.

[neoblues]

66. Yes. A nice oversimplification, but...

in a sense, the market will solve all (one way or another); I just hope as few people as possible are abused in the process.

[buddysmellgood]

68. There lies the problem. It would be nice if people would choose to buy local before

it all falls apart...unfortunately, we've become a country that doesn't do anything until it's just about too late.

[phantom power]

17. Hey, they can hire people for $50/hr, just like McCain suggested.

[Greyhound]

18. "I don't care if you paid $40 (an hour), they'd do it about three hours and say, 'That's not for me,

And yet, just like McCain's repeat of this lie, they never actually offer the $40 or $50 an hour to test this "theory".

I hereby offer my college-educated ass to any growers that want to hire me (and Ms. Greyhound too) for $40 p/hr. We will pack up and move within 1 week and help get those crops picked. So c'mon, prove your point and make us all liars.

[MADem]

27. How much would the broccoli cost if the workers were paid that much?

I honestly don't know how they pay them--is it by the hour, or by the amount harvested?

[Greyhound]

29. Two points.

1.) current rate in AZ is $8 + production bonus that can raise it to $12. No overtime, no benefits.

2.) Numerous studies show that the amount paid to the field workers constitutes <1% of the cost of produce in the store. Therefore a big hike like $40 an hour would be reflected in the price, but not nearly as much as the corporatists constantly bleat about, their real concern is to maintain the status quo. They benefit greatly from the underclass status of the field workers, and the horribly inefficient corporate pricing and distribution scheme, and the last thing they want is a precedent of paying a living wage for the back-breaking labor required and even more frightening to them is the idea of a bunch of educated citizens with the knowledge of their rights and the means to enforce them.

Don't worry, nobody will take us up on the offer, they will let this harvest rot and it will provide them with the excuse they're looking for to double or triple the cost of produce, incidentally:eyes: increasing profits even more. And after bitching for awhile about the price of food, the sheep will go back to their cuds and traditional somnambulism.

[hedgehog]

31. When I was working for an onion packer, I noticed that

if he could pass the costs on up the line, he could double wages and it would raise the price of onions about 2 cents a pound!

[Greyhound]

37. and onions are one of the cheapest produce, with the lowest margins. n/t

[NuttyFluffers]

51. holy crap! +$0.02 lb would totally put onions outta my budget!

:evilgrin:

yeah, it's pretty amazing the lies we end up buying without thinking about it first. framing the issues and sound biting the retorts works, huh?
:7

[grizmaster]

44. how they pay depends on the product

but even when it's not by the amount they generally pay the faster workes more

As to the cost from added wage costs- the picking labor is a tiny fraction of what you pay. You probably wouldn't even notice the difference.

Here's a piece based on ten year old figures, and the second link leads to a story about the agra biz planting phony labor shortage articles.

http://www.utexas.edu/lbj/uscir/binpapers/v3a-2martin.pdf

Farmers received about 19 percent of the average retail price for fresh fruits ($26 of $135), and 23 percent of the retail price of fresh vegetables ($31 of $135),
so that farmers get $57 or 21 percent of the $270 average retail expenditures on fresh fruits and vegetables. Farm labor, including supervisory labor, typically represents about one-third of farmers’ costs of production for fresh fruits and vegetables, or farm labor represents about $8.60 of the $26 that the average U.S. consumer unit spends on fresh fruit, and $10.20 of spending on fresh vegetables, or a total $19 per consumer unit per year.

Suppose that current levels of immigration hold farm wages 50 percent below the level they would otherwise be, so that current farm worker wages of $5 to $6 per hour would be $7.50 to $9 per hour without additional immigrant workers. And suppose that the entire cost of higher farm wages is passed through to consumers, so that the annual cost of the farm labor used to produce the fresh fruit consumed by the average American household rises from $8.60 to $13, and the cost of farm labor to produce fresh vegetables rises from $10.20 to $15.

If these increased farm labor costs were completely passed through to consumers, spending on fresh fruits and vegetables eaten at home for a typical 2.6 person consumer unit would rise by almost $10, from $270 to $280

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/061008_pearanoia.htm

[NickB79]

65. Got room for one more?

My college-educated ass would also pick veggies for $40/hr. Hell, I shovelled pigshit as a kid for $4/hr, every day of the week on my dad's farm in the 1990's.

[denverbill]

21. Maybe we need to import some Chinese to do the jobs Mexicans won't do.

</sarcasm>

I have no sympathy for these farmers. For years they've taken advantage of the system and hired illegal aliens at below market wages because they knew the illegal aliens couldn't complain.

I have no problem with creating a guest worker program for jobs in agriculture. I do have a problem with them not going home when their jobs are done and getting jobs in food service, construction, landscaping, and other areas, which Americans WOULD do if competition from cheap illegal labor didn't drive down wages so much.

And if it turns out we need more immigrant labor, fine, we expand the guest worker program and/or better yet, increase the number of people from Mexico who want to move to the US and become citizens.

But however it's done, it needs to be done legally.

[Greyhound]

38. Lets at least try to attract our own workers to these jobs before we get into

the whole "guest worker" mess. The costs associated with these programs are enormous and none of it goes to workers.

[aggiesal]

42. Why don't the farmers go down to the unemployment line ...

and pull as many workers as needed.
This would solve 2 problems.
1) Getting people off welfare,
2) Resolve their manpower shortage.

Oooops, I'm sorry. This would create the problem, where
the farmer would actually have to pay a LIVING WAGE

[MADem]

62. Well, the CONGRESS has a role in that "living wage" too. They need to get off their asses and pass

a decent minimum wage law.

[grizmaster]

45. I'll second you on that

I want the immigrants to be legal only, and I want everybody to be following our labor and wage laws.

[hedgehog]

30. Good - it's about time prices went up in the supermarkets!

I don't know about factory farms out in the Southwest and California, but in upstate New York, most of our farmers actually do physical labor on their farms taking care of dairy cattle or raising potatoes, cabbage, lettuce, onions, apples, strawberries etc. with 1 -20 employees. These guys pay squat, but then they are either losing money (the dairy farmers) or barely breaking a profit. Wal-Mart squeezes these guys on price like you wouldn't believe and demands absolutely perfect produce. It's easy to condemn farmers for hiring illegals and not paying a decent wage, but no one makes the connection to the cheap prices we pay at the grocery store!

[buddysmellgood]

50. And we waste SO MUCH food. It's a sin. And I'm not all that religious.

[Porcupine]

33. Lazy "farmers" are just refusing to pay real wages.

I go to a farmers market every Saturday that is several hundred miles north of any spot in Arizona. The majority of the growers are permanent residents and the prices for greens are well below supermarket prices. More than a few of these growers are college educated. One is actually a retired junior college instructor.

If college educated US citzens can make money growing greens in Chico CA. at 40 degrees north then this guy in Arizona can pay more or shut up. He's growing a glut of gov't. subsidized, chemically saturated non-food for a corporate monopoly market. His farm only<[/b>works by screwing both the taxpayer and the laborer.

[Odin2005]

34. Typical Neo-Liberal Globalist spin.

They are looking for an excuse to bring in more slave labor to keep wages low.

[High Plains]

39. I'd like to some loudmouths here go try picking field crops...

...at any wage. And move to some Godforsaken hellhole to do it.

[Le Taz Hot]

55. Um, 'scuze me.

How do you do. I'm LeTazHot. I live in Fresno, CA, one of those "Godforsaken hellholes" to which you so ignorantly refer. There have been some excellent posts on this subject up the line from this one which is why I didn't feel the need to comment. I suggest you read them. In the meantime, may I remind you that we have lots and lots of Democrat, activist, intelligent, hard-working people in this and other "Godforsaken hellholes" who have worked their ever-lovin' asses off AND give lots and lots of money to Democratic candidates throughout the years. I might suggest we don't alienate them or their choice of hometown.

Sincerey,

LTH

[SoCalDem]

40. It's a natural result of consolidation of "farming"..

Young people don't remember when we had SEASONAL veggies & fruits.

If you wanted peaches, you waited until they were in season (in your area)..

It's one reason why people used to buy in bulk, in season, and CAN stuff for later on.

Apples were a FALL fruit
Peaches, grapes, cherries SUMMER
Tomatoes>>SUMMER

Local grocers bought LOCAL, so we were all used to pigging out on the stuff that was in season, then waving a fond farewell until next year.

Modern Americans want EVERYTHING....ALL THE TIME.. and we expect it to be CHEAP..

The farmers get very little, the pickers even LESS...

The grocers get very little..

IT'S all going to the middlemen and transportation..

Of course now that most communities have paved over farms in favor of ticky-tacky boxes and Walmarts, we are reliant on "mega-farms" and transport.

[grizmaster]

43. soon as they offer a decent wage they'll have workers

and if that adds 5 cents to a head of lettuce that's more than fine by me. I'd rather they paid an American wage than abuse the illegals with slave wages.

[truthisfreedom]

48. RELEASE THE ROBOTS!

we need robot pickers, now.

[grasswire]

52. a head of iceberg lettuce at my local grocery is 49 cents

That's the price, year-round, for half a dozen years now. 49 cents a head. Nice, clean, crunchy iceberg.

[MADem]

63. It is much more expensive in the northeast, though. NT

[Marrah_G]

56. What makes anyone think

that by legalizing 12 million illegal immigrants it will change anything?

Here is a clue: Those people hiring cheap illegal workers do not want to follow laborand safety laws, they don't want to pay a fair wage and they certainly do not want to be liable for compensation when their workers get hurt.

What will happen is that you will have 12 million workers damanding fair working conditions and wages and asshole employers shrugging as they replace those troublemakers with NEW illegal workers who won't make trouble for them.

People don't hire illegals because they can't find legal workers. They hire illegals because they want cheap labor to exploit that will not fight back.

It's all about the profit.

[JVS]

67. I'm waiting for my $50/hr