After Trump’s immigration order, anxiety grows in Florida’s vegetable fields

A picker in FL is not going to make $15 to $20 per hour, that's just BS. I looked into it years ago, it was barely MW at the farms keeping everything (and everyone) legal, and WAY under that for those going under-the-table on it. The latter is a very widespread practice, most are familiar with the concept of being paid by the bushel. That's the el cheapo way to pay out, and farms prefer it.

Needless to say, I wasn't going to put up with that kind of brutal heat & humidity for that LITTLE of a wage, F off to the farm owners. I get that the migrants,legal or otherwise, are the only ones willing to do it (they tend to come from hotter, more hellishly humid areas anyway, thus are tempered for it) but it's taking advantage of the desperate and making slaves of them.

I would think, that in order to make it appear legit on their taxes, farmers would pay an independent contractor who then hires illegals to do the work. That keeps the farmer's hands clean and puts the legal aspects on the contractor. I wouldn't know about that really, but if I were a farmer, that is how I would approach the situation.

A migrant needs to do the paperwork and they can come here and work. Then they take their hard earned cash and go home when the seasons over. Not a big deal but they don't want to leave.

originally posted by: queenofswords
It's all going to be automated soon anyway.

Robots Step Into New Planting, Harvesting Roles
Labor shortage spurs farmers to use robots for handling delicate tasks in the fresh-produce industry[/exwww.wsj.com...

Uh huh. Except small farmers can't afford to automate, big corporations will gain an even tighter strangle-hold on our food supply. But no one will worry because costs will stay down. At first.

Farmers are the cheapest bastards I've ever met, they drive new trucks every year and have nice brick homes with big pools, toys for their kids. But every time I went to do business with them they were always saying farmers are poor, the sky is falling, can't make ends meet. Bullpucky! They scam off govt subsidies, pay their labor like slaves, and treat them like dirt. Ohh and when they have a bad season, they still get paid by the govt and insurance claims, it's win win with being a farmer. Total scam. BTW, out mid west all they grow is endless Fields Corn and soybeans as far as the eye can see, Very little food we actually consume. And very bad for you if you did try to eat it.

a reply to: Liquesence

You automatically equate "illegals" with "criminal activity?"

well lets see,
1. they entered the country illegally, that's at least one law broken, and continuing to stay is activity.
2. it's highly doubtful they pay taxes. that's at least two laws broken
3. there is no telling how many other laws that they break due to the fact that they are here illegally, and have to stay out of much of the system. a couple that come to mind, driving without a license, some use fake id's, i'm sure i could come up with a big long list of things they do that is against the law.

if that's not criminal activity, which falls under the definition of crime,

crime
1. An act committed in violation of law where the consequence of conviction by a court is punishment, especially where the punishment is a serious one such as imprisonment.
2. Unlawful activity: statistics relating to violent crime.
3. A serious offense, especially one in violation of morality.
4. An unjust, senseless, or disgraceful act or condition: It's a crime to waste all that paper.

,

i don't know what is. if i was to do half of what they do as natural born citizen i would be in under the jailhouse and they would be pumping sunshine down to me.

a reply to: 38181

BTW, out mid west all they grow is endless Fields Corn and soybeans as far as the eye can see, Very little food we actually consume.

corn and soybeans are the most used products in food there is.
corn is used to make, flour, meal, chips, taco shells, bread, cooking oil, margarine,baked breads, crackers, cakes, cookies and pies. it is also used for feed for live stock.

soybeans are turned into oil, it is used to fry food, in margarine, it is also used by lots of manufacturers of baked breads, crackers, cakes, cookies and pies use soybean oil in their recipes . then the meal that is left after exacting the oil is used for feed for live stock that is slaughters for that burger, chicken, bacon that you eat.
almost every thing you eat has a corn or soybean product involved with it.

and besides that machines are used to harvest corn and soybeans, not pickers.

a reply to: rickymouse

I agree. Skilled and manual labor are undervalued here, I don't know why. I have gone back to college and what you say is true, the graduates coming out of there have no concept of work value in the real world. Most expect waaaay too much and cannot understand that they aren't worth that much to hiring companies. The idea of doing a manual job is completely beneath them, but I for one would rather work at a job where I actually know how to make something. Wow, if I could rely on 15-20 an hour picking crops - sign me up right now!

Keep in mind this is supposedly called a "Capitalist" model we have at work here.

cap·i·tal·ize
ˈkapədlˌīz/
verb
verb: capitalise
1.
take the chance to gain advantage from.

...........

Ah, I get it now "Take Advantage-ism".

While we are all busy arguing about meaningless things, we are all being exploited.

Divided and Conquered....

a reply to: seasonal

Well at 15 to 20 dollars an hour, fast food workers should be all over those jobs.....just looking in the wrong spots.

a reply to: seasonal

Well we got misdemeanors inmates picking trash in the highway supervised by police as their community service part of sentences, why not let them make the 15-20 dollars an hour picking vegetables so they can feed their many welfare children, see petty stealing is easier for them than earning money in an honest way.

I say let minor charges inmates do the picking for a honest wage.

originally posted by: Liquesence
a reply to: seasonal

Yes, and when people start not getting their fruits and veggies, or when they have to pay higher prices for them, perhaps they will realize everything is not as simple as they've been told.

I can't believe Obama let this abuse of illegals happen for eight years........how dare he do that. I remember those HUGE protests against the Obama Admin for exploiting these "undocumented " workers.....oh wait.

be careful of the laws you push... mandated pay levels will have a very high chance of killing what is left of the family owned farms in many parts of the country.



If we are ready to throw in the towel and have all farming be corporate owned, then by all means go after it.

a reply to: Irishhaf

If the family farm can't pay a decent wage, then they need to sell. Slave labor is no excuse to keep a business running.

a reply to: pavil

Not only did the abuse continue on the farms, he also allowed the abuse to still take place from NAFTA, you know the thing that "we need to do something about". But he said that during a campaign, so it is like it never happened.

a reply to: marg6043

That wage does not exist. And there is no possibility on the horizon that it will. The system is about profits, it is almost slave labor for the farmer and the labor.

Look at the chicken farms, and veg farmers. Documentaries are pretty raw and this is about corps and profit period. Tyson comes to mind.

a reply to: seasonal


The Mexican government could vet migrants there in good faith and trust, then get a proper ID work card with their home info and they can travel around the country no problem but must be found at any time to be doing agricultural work. No problems. No more drifting around undocumented if that the problem.

a reply to: seasonal

I live in the south, when I was working for a lawyer that specialized in migrant workers I can tell you horror stories of slavery that you can not imagine happening in the US specially in the south, at least the crack down on this practices has been ongoing for the last 15 years.

a reply to: seasonal

Mandated pay like some have suggested will not work at the federal level...

remove the picker aspect of things and just apply the minimum wage argument, what works in one area will not necessarily work in another.

Also I did some picking when I was a kid, slave labor it was not, pay might not have been great, and yea the work was hard, but the families I went to and picked at provided food and shelter as well for the folks working the field, and the families typically had a very good relationship with the workers that came back each year. (admittedly this was 35 years ago.)

As in most things my microcosm is not meant to be a sweeping statement for every farm.

originally posted by: Starcrossd
a reply to: rickymouse

I agree. Skilled and manual labor are undervalued here, I don't know why. I have gone back to college and what you say is true, the graduates coming out of there have no concept of work value in the real world. Most expect waaaay too much and cannot understand that they aren't worth that much to hiring companies. The idea of doing a manual job is completely beneath them, but I for one would rather work at a job where I actually know how to make something. Wow, if I could rely on 15-20 an hour picking crops - sign me up right now!

This is not a little problem, it is a big problem in our society. Picking crops is actually pretty nice work, but when you are working in fields full of pesticides, it isn't really a good thing. I grew up working on the farm in the summer, I liked it, planting and picking potatoes and strawberries. Taking care of the chickens and collecting eggs out of the coup. I did not like the smell of the pesticides my dad sprayed on the fields though, he used DDT because it was proven to be perfectly safe. He died from brain cancer at fifty years old, it was shown that high exposure to DDT can cause brain cancer in many farmers and food workers right after that and DDT was banned. I was on the tractor with him spraying a few times with a hankerchief covering our mouths. Guess what, the replacements for DDT have been banned many times, the present one will be banned within probably three more years.

These Immigrants are being exposed to a lot of pesticides and herbicides in their work, especially with GMO crops. I wouldn't want to be doing that anymore except in an organic setting. The use of some of these chemicals has exploded over the past ten years. They raised allowable residue limits on the food of some of them.

I'm still here, I am sixty one, I have some problems with my lungs, possibly from exposure when I was young. Bigger than normal lymph nodes in the lungs, possibly from dust exposure from working in dusty jobs and with chemicals quite a bit. Those pipe cleaners for PVC and ABS are hard on the lungs too.