Posted on 06/15/2011 4:19:25 PM PDT by arderkrag
On Tuesday, Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal released the results of a survey that he had requested from the state agriculture commissioner on farm labor shortages in Georgia. The survey found that there are approximately 11,080 unfilled farm jobs in the state.
In response to the report, Deal suggested that people who are on criminal probation could fill the job openings: “There are 100,000 probationers statewide, 8,000 of which are in the Southwest region of the state and 25 percent of which are unemployed.” According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, although probationers in Georgia are required to find employment if possible, state officials cannot compel them to take one particular job over another.
The director of the American Probation and Parole Association told Bloomberg that the temporary nature of agricultural work makes it unsuitable for people on criminal probation who need to rebuild their lives in a more permanent job. He compared Deal’s suggestion to the “work farms” of the past, when convicts could be sentenced to hard labor in the fields.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonindependent.com ...
May seem to be a good idea, but I’ll bet that the prisons are full of slackers. It would probaly take three of them to do the work of one Mexican.
There is no shortage of farmer workers, there is a shortage of farmers who wish to hire honest legal labor. There are 14 different federal programs to allow legal imported labor, but then that costs more than off the book illegal labor.
They built roads and stuff back in the 1920’ didn’t they? If there are any union jobs though watch them squeal. “We don’t want to do that work but then neither can you”
Bring back the chain gangs. Put them to work before they leave prison.
As if they all HAVE permanent jobs.
Funny you say that...
Just watched a story on local Atlanta news...
Had a crew of native probationers working beside a crew of migrants pickin cukes...
Or should I say behind?
And at night the chain gangs can have egg eating contests. Great stuff!
When I was a kid we lived in a house that was surrounded by Southern Michigan prison farms. It wasn’t unusual for us to play in the yard just a few yards from inmates baling hay. There was a guard with a shotgun leaning against the fence talking to my dad.
There were no problems till they started trusting the inmates to go out and work with no supervision. Then a man and his wife died at the hands of a man named Harden Bey who took what he wanted, stepped back over the fence, finished his workday and went back to his cell.
Actually, we have chain gangs here in GA. Now, granted, they aren’t physically chained - they have ankle tags and guards with repeating shotguns to keep them in line. Either way, the roads look nice as a result!
There is also a shortage of farmers who wish to hire dishonest legal labor.
“There is no shortage of farmer workers, there is a shortage of farmers who wish to hire honest legal labor. There are 14 different federal programs to allow legal imported labor, but then that costs more than off the book illegal labor.”
Which is why the tax code must be fixed.
We use prisoners for roadwork here in Florida. They are non-violent offenders and are closely supervised. However, those are state projects.
But farmworkers would be working for private businesses, and IIRC, convict leasing was outlawed several years ago.
In any case, immigrants don’t require state officers to supervise them (which is necessary if you have prisoners) and they usually have a better work ethic than our domestic criminal population.
That said, IMHO, the solution for farm work is short-term visas - lots of them - for people from the continental Americas.
As for prisoners, I think they could be used more heavily in state projects, because they might actually learn some skills and think about doing something other than making meth. But this would require changes in state laws.
Prison labor on certain state projects works well in Florida and throughout the South, and I’ve never understood why it’s not done in other states.
Very scary story. And you did a wonderful job of recounting it in one sentence. Great writing.
Cool! Not sure if we have them here in Cali, but our roads are dirty and full of holes. Sounds like a bad joke about democrat politicians hehe.
You don’t want convicts scoping out your place...bad idea for private enterprise. Use them on public projects, closely supervised.
Prisoners should work, but it should be to reduce the cost of their upkeep - laundry, meals, landscaping, etc.
The last thing we want is to create a situation where profits can be made from incarcerated labor. Imagine what would happen - in terms of lobbying, and corruption - if GE, or Monsanto, for example, could use convict labor. It would be a slippery slope. We’d slide down it fast.
"What we've got here is ... failure to germinate"
Finally some shovel ready jobs
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