Virtually all crops now can be harvested mechanically.
There are laws in California which actually prevent a) using such machinery and b) researching and developing them by the state schools.
Jerry Brown pushed this garbage through the legislature in the 1970s at the insistence of the UFW (you know, Cesar Chavez and the gang). Job protection por los campesinos. If we didn’t have that, there would be ZERO of them in the fields anymore.
Next time you hear those buttwipes griping about their jobs, just laugh.
I did the inflation calculation on the grape picker wage Chavez negotiated in 1966...
Old Wage - $1.25 (1966) - $11.94 (2023)
Chavez Wage - $1.75 (1966) - $16.72 (2023)