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Yes, Build the Wall, But Realize That We'll Still Need Seasonal Agricultural Workers
PJ Media ^ | 02/23/2017 | Mark Ellis

Posted on 02/23/2017 12:27:49 PM PST by SeekAndFind

It was 1967. The local music store had an ink-blue Mosrite Ventures solid body electric guitar, and I wanted it badly. Cost: $500. My family was not poor, but neither could they drop five bills on one of four children. My first guitar was a $29.99 Stella acoustic from Sears. There was only one way to get the guitar of my dreams: a summer job.

Complication: I had long hair, and even in the psychedelic sixties, few legitimate employers wanted that at their front counters or even their back rooms. All the head shop jobs were taken. We lived in Napa, California, and lucky for me a local farm was hiring plum pickers at $15 per 4X4 foot crate. I talked my buddy Dennis—another unemployable long-hair—into applying for the job with me. We were hired on the spot.

I am a border hawk. I am on record as supporting the most stringent of President Trump’s immigration proposals. In my opinion, the 1986 Simpson-Mazzoli Act (aka the Reagan Amnesty) was the biggest mistake in President Reagan’s otherwise magnificent presidency. I believe that securing the border is a ballgame issue.

However, based on my short stint as a plum picker, I know that we’re going to need some kind of seasonal agricultural work permit legislation to get the crops picked. Illegal aliens are doing most of this work now. Unless we want to pay five dollars for a head of lettuce to support $20 per hour jobs with bennies to work the fields, Americans will not do this work, and even then…

The day began with a forklift dropping off a crate at the end of a row of plum trees in a vast orchard. We were not picking these plums off the trees. Since they were destined to be processed as prunes, not grocery produce, we were picking them up off the ground. The tree-shaker had been around before dawn, and there were scores, sometimes hundreds, of fallen plums under every tree.

Since it was piecework, there was nothing to be gained by milking the clock. Dennis and I got busy. The morning hours went OK, as it was still relatively cool. We were healthy teens with a lot of energy. If we could do three crates before lunch, we would split $45; if we could equal that effort after lunch, we’d each take home $45 a day. By that equation, I’d have that Mosrite in about 10 days, at which time I intended to unceremoniously quit by not showing up.

Since we had no vehicle and the farm was on the road to Calistoga, we had to bring a lunch. A couple of times my mother drove out in our Buick Invicta wagon and brought us hamburgers, but mostly it was brought-along sandwiches (whose mayonnaise congealed in the plastic bags) and maybe a bag of Fritos. After the first day, the idea of snacking on a plum or two was unthinkable. Water was provided by a free-standing hose spigot in the field.

Bottom line, we never got those three crates after lunch. The California sun became oppressive on summer afternoons, and trees denuded of their fruit provided little shade. We lagged, lollygagged, bitched, and considered walking off the job, always picking, but at a much slower rate. By three p.m., heat prostration, if not full-on sunstroke, was a real possibility. We were sick to our stomachs, and the sight of another tree-load of warm, syrupy plums was enough to make us hurl.

The forklift came, took our full crate, and then brought another empty one. The farm boss had made clear that if we left a crate unfilled on any given day, we needn’t bother to show up for work the next day. We worked hard to fill two crates after lunch.

On about the fifth day, I noticed that our coworkers, all Hispanic, were doing things differently. By the time Dennis and I got dropped off by my mother at 8:30 a.m., they’d been on the job for hours, taking advantage of first daylight, and they rarely stuck around after two p.m. Whole families picked as a team, including young children, and they’d repeatedly blow past us in the adjoining rows, filling crates at top speed.

After a day in the orchard, my head hurt, like a delayed effect sun-fever, and the thought of going back out in the morning troubled my sleep.

Long story short, I got the guitar, but not because I stuck it out. After a week picking plums, Dennis and I had had enough, and went back to what seemed like a more productive summertime endeavor: smoking pot and chasing chicks at downtown Napa’s Fuller Park.

I’d saved a little under $200 from my time as an agricultural worker, and my parents, with what I reckon was a combination of pity and admiration for my attempt, made up the difference. Today that guitar is worth over four grand; I wish I’d kept it.

That was fifty years ago. For all our technological and mechanical advancement, the job of harvesting the products of our nation’s vast agricultural acreage hasn’t changed much since.

Yes, build the wall, enact Kate’s Law, rescind DACA, and crack down on illegal immigration. But we’re going to have to figure out a program that allows people to do a job that this American would never do again, unless I was starving.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: agriculture; aliens; buildthewall; chamberofamnesty; freetraitor; helpwanted; illegalaliens; illegals; immigration; junknews; wall; workers
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To: cyclotic

As a computer science professor, I had a notable bright student who relished his bright-blue hair and deranged attire. One day, instead of seeing him arrive, there was a new sensibly-dressed fellow with jet-black hair. Ooops, same guy. Seems he nailed an interview for a really interesting job - but was told he didn’t get it because of his unprofessional appearance. Kid learned fast the hard way.


41 posted on 02/23/2017 12:54:01 PM PST by ctdonath2 (Understand the Left: "The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the Revolution.")
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To: Farmer Dean

That’s true. And as soon as it is more expensive for them to pay for the illegals than it is for the machinery they will switch. They get cheaper labor, and the taxpayers have to pay for the now mandatory services for their families, and it is supposed to be for our benefit because our lettuce is cheap? I’ll pay more for lettuce.


42 posted on 02/23/2017 12:56:38 PM PST by Rusty0604
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To: buwaya

Yup, my mother worked in the fields growing up (eventually earning her Electrical Engineering degree).

Problem nowadays is the Left is he11-bent on criminalizing low-value work. If you can’t produce at least $15/hr value, they want to punish you for working at all.


43 posted on 02/23/2017 12:58:57 PM PST by ctdonath2 (Understand the Left: "The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the Revolution.")
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To: ctdonath2

Good lesson to learn.

A few years ago, we had an after hours company function. Our intern got himself rip-roaring drunk and it really wasn’t pretty.

Several of us, including a couple high level execs separately took it upon ourselves to have a conversation with him and counsel him that even after hours, you’re still on duty and need to act like it.

A former employee, who was probably let go ultimately because of his drinking passed out and froze to death in his driveway a couple years before that incident so this kid was shown that he was going down a bad path.


44 posted on 02/23/2017 12:59:33 PM PST by cyclotic (Republicans Are without excuse. Flood the Resolute Desk with sane legislation.)
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To: SeekAndFind

There’s no reason we can’t have a sane, organized guest worker program.


45 posted on 02/23/2017 1:00:22 PM PST by Ted Grant
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To: SeekAndFind

Benjamin, I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Yes, sir.

Are you listening?

Yes, I am.

Robots


46 posted on 02/23/2017 1:01:00 PM PST by x1stcav (Leftism is like rust: It corrodes 24 hours a day until eradicated.)
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To: SeekAndFind

30 years ago there was no shortage of documented seasonal-workers in my area. The farmers provided housing, mid-day meal and bus transportation to and from Mexico.

The use of illegals removed the above benefits from the work contract which was replaced with a day’s pay for a day’s work.

Some farmers even went as far as to go to Mexico and contract with certain villages to provide the labor. The villagers like it because they got a free ride/lodging/meal each day and were able to work with the same people they grew up with. At the end of the season everyone went home on the same bus and took care of Mexico stuff then returned the next season.

The responsibility lays with the farmer to obtain labor. Profits will not be as high as with illegal workers but everyone is going to have to pay the price for our national sin of ignoring the law for the past 30 years.

The notion that we are all going to starve is ludicrous.


47 posted on 02/23/2017 1:05:48 PM PST by Rebelbase
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To: SeekAndFind
they have such legal programs.

(of course when some of them tried to unionize and then they were replaced by a machine...)


48 posted on 02/23/2017 1:06:33 PM PST by longtermmemmory (VOTE! http://www.senate.gov and http://www.house.gov)
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To: SeekAndFind

Bkmk


49 posted on 02/23/2017 1:07:58 PM PST by 2CAVTrooper (Democrats... BETRAYING America since 1828.)
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To: All

I have a friend who sells farm machinery to farmers to avoid using illegal labor and the problems associated with that.

The first is a unique one that be towed by a four wheel drive pickup truck and it clears about 2 acres+ per hour:

See the link below for this reasonable priced equipment:

http://www.scottsturfequipment.net/showcaseproductdetail.htm?id=22142674

The next one cuts brush, trees up to 6 inches:

http://www.skidsteers.com/extreme-brush-cutter.html?gclid=CjwKEAiArbrFBRDL4Oiz97GP2nISJAAmJMFaqlZgpg2oVdvC0EUKmsFxhct0IZfNdUiT7V7sSPilQxoCuEfw_wcB

The other one is a big piece of equipment capable of clearing weeds at the rate of 20 to 25 acres per hour. I don’t have the link for that one.


50 posted on 02/23/2017 1:10:23 PM PST by Grampa Dave (No country has a right to ship their poverty laden, killers, rapists & criminals to our/my country!!)
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To: Buckeye McFrog
Tell some of our 94 million domestic dole leeches to get off the couch and go pick some strawberries.

My 73 year old parents would have a hard time picking strawberries.

51 posted on 02/23/2017 1:11:52 PM PST by DoodleDawg
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To: cyclotic

I consciously cut my hair short at 17, and kept it that way, so that people would not think I was/am a pot head.

It was mostly a police thing. They always seemed to go for the low hanging fruit.


52 posted on 02/23/2017 1:21:56 PM PST by T-Bone Texan
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To: SeekAndFind

“On about the fifth day, I noticed that our coworkers, all Hispanic, were doing things differently. By the time Dennis and I got dropped off by my mother at 8:30 a.m., they’d been on the job for hours, taking advantage of first daylight, and they rarely stuck around after two p.m.”

So we noticed this and we noticed that and we saw this and we saw this and we saw that and we experienced this and we experienced that but we somehow COULD NOT LEARN THIS PART.


53 posted on 02/23/2017 1:24:32 PM PST by Attention Surplus Disorder (Apoplectic is where we want them!)
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To: cyclotic

“ultimately because of his drinking passed out and froze to death”

That’s what happened to Senator George McGovern’s daughter——very sad story.

.


54 posted on 02/23/2017 1:28:13 PM PST by Mears
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To: SeekAndFind

Could we have welfare recipients do it as a condition of benefits?


55 posted on 02/23/2017 1:28:44 PM PST by TBP (0bama lies, Granny dies.)
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To: Parmy

I have and have had several clients that are building H2A worker housing facilities on their property over the past 2 years here in the Yakima Valley.

Working on 2 projects for them right now. They are required to build modern living quarters for them. No more shanty housing sites. Most build soccer fields for them as well. Camps typically range between 48-96 workers.


56 posted on 02/23/2017 1:28:54 PM PST by shotgun
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To: RedWulf

They can’t pick asparagus with a machine. Although they have been trying to develop one for the past 20 years


57 posted on 02/23/2017 1:30:04 PM PST by shotgun
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To: SeekAndFind

Of course, you could have followed their example, started at daylight and knocked off around 2:00.


58 posted on 02/23/2017 1:31:27 PM PST by gogeo (When your life is based on a false premise...you are indeed insane.)
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To: SeekAndFind

I picked shade tobacco in Windsor CT from 1972 to 1975(age 14-17). Started out at 1.38 an hour the 1st year and got up to 1.95 the last year.

Had to get up at 5:30 and walk 2 miles to the bus stop. With 2 PBJ sandwiches in a bag and a jug of Kool-Aide in my hands.

The season was about 10 weeks long. The 1st week was suckuring, picking off the little useless leaves on the plant.You were sitting on the rocky ground for 8 hours going from plant to plant. Rain or shine.

When the plants started getting big enough to pick, They took a ruler measured at 14 inches and drew a line on your arm and you picked the leaves that were that size and longer.

It was hot and dirty work. Tobacco is sticky. After 8 hours your hair on your arms and head are coated with the sticky tars. It took 20 minutes of showering to wash off the filth.

Back then it was a right of passage for the local kids to work the farms and make good money. By the 80’s the kids stopped working that job. The farms started bringing more migrants in to do the work. This type of farming will never be automated even today because the fragility of the tobacco leave.

If you ever read MLK’s autobiography, he devoted a chapter of his time working in the same tobacco fields of Connecticut.


59 posted on 02/23/2017 1:32:03 PM PST by dancusa ( Trump Wins! Obama's 8 years of a kindergarten class trip is over. The adults are in charge now..)
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To: SeekAndFind

...And the $5/head lettuce is total BS.


60 posted on 02/23/2017 1:33:24 PM PST by gogeo (When your life is based on a false premise...you are indeed insane.)
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