[lainie]

I saw a story, in the Raleigh News & Observer, quoting actual farmers in North Carolina who are saying THERE AREN'T ENOUGH ILLEGALS FOR US TO GET THE CROPS HARVESTED. They're on record. Twenty years ago I spent time putting tobacco up, and crops were what every kid did, all summer long. Just bringing this up at FR brought others who had a similar experience out, but it also incurred comments to me, how idiotic I must be to even suggest that teenagers would or could do this work. I don't even understand what is going on any more.

[jmyrlefuller]

Reminds me of this story:

“Summer Jobs are Scarce: It’s getting tougher for teens to find summer jobs”
http://www.wkbw.com/features/kids/7891697.html

Part of it is a sort of loss of work ethic among the populace, but is it an entire coincidence that the illegal seasonal worker skyrocket and summer job dearth are occurring at the same time? These are jobs that teenagers could easily be doing.

[operation clinton cleanup]

I lived in Eastern North Carolina through most of the 1990’s. My wife worked at Carolina Turkeys near Goldsboro as an HR person (she spoke Spanish as a first language). 80% of the employees there were illegal immigrants earning minimum wage. They lived 20-30 people in company provided mobile homes. I sh!t you not!

[fkabuckeyesrule]

The was a PBS show I saw recently about tobacco farmers. One farmer did not make enough selling his tobacco so he got a part time job at a funeral home. How ironic. LOL!

[TechJunkYard]

Apparently, we do need a permanent "underclass" in this country to do the tough agri work.

Or import all of our food.

From China.

And create some new jobs for USDA inspectors.