Posted on 05/18/2007 5:26:12 PM PDT by mombyprofession
Finding farm workers not that easy
Updated: May 17, 2007 06:20 PM
By ANNE SCHIEBER
HART - Even though Michigan has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country, finding workers to fill farm jobs is not that easy.
At a Michigan Works office, 24 Hour News 8 found no shortage of workers who wanted the farm jobs. But many workers are in the same boat as Sam Williams. They don't have a car to get to the jobs up north.
"I guess, how you would say, someone to come pick me up at a designated spot, I'd be more than glad to go out there and work," Williams said.
Farmers have done that, but the work is long and hard and farmers want workers who know what they're doing and won't damage their crops. It's not for everyone.
"They've tried getting local people to do it and they'll try it but they might be able to pick for a half a day," said Becky Carpentier of the Michigan Works office in Sparta, "but they won't come back tomorrow."
It's not as simple as raising wages. Michigan farmers compete with imports, where wages are a fraction of what they are in the US. The Sparta Michigan Works office said farmers don't even have to raise wages to attract migrant workers.
"What they're looking for is how they are treated," said the office's Olivia Alverado. "Not so much what the wages are. Minimum wage has gone up and people were pretty happy with that minimum wage."
Minimum wage is a far cry from what factories have paid workers. Workers say there's still a psychological adjustment. "People underestimate the satisfaction you get," said fast food restaurant worker Cory Jerard, "from good wholesome manual labor."
Besides there are plenty of jobs that pay minimum wage where unemployed workers don't need to travel up north to farm fields. And there are no help wanted signs.
But our unemployment rate is over 7%!!! What the heck???!!!
Who is going to do the work illegals don’t want?
Unemployment checks beat picking crops?
It’s the same way here. You can’t find locals to work in the tobacco or hay fields. All of our farmers hire migrants. Some hire legals and some hire illegals. Legals are fine; illegals are not. I’m all for them working our farms if they are documented but that is the only way.
BS-ometer going off.
It’s a matter of pride. Our entitlement culture has breed people who view these jobs as beneath them. Why work in the fields if you can sit home and collect a check? As far as migrant workers (and illegals) they are EVERYWHERE in West Michigan, particularly on the lakeshore.
High school kids would love to do some of the jobs.
Did a lot of picking in my younger days too.
Trouble is nowadays with all the regulations and pay demands kids are pretty much left out of the loop.
A few farmers still have kids put up hay and hire kids but most have mechanized. Less hassle.
I bet their prisons are bursting at the seams.
Therefore...
chain gangs.
C’mon over to Chicago. We’ve got a boatload.
Pay enough money and you won’t need to hire illegal aliens.
Tennessee?
Perhaps Algore can help:
"I want you to know that with my own hands, all of my life, I put it in plant beds and transferred it. I've hoed it, I've dug it, I've sprayed it, I've chopped it, Ive shredded it, spiked it, put it in the barn and stripped it, and sold it."
Maybe he was talking about pot, not tobacco.
LOL, Gore is insane.
A friend of ours tried to hire teenagers to help him with his hay last year. The first day, two passed out in the heat and had to be taken to the hospital. None came back the next day. He refused to hire Mexicans so he did it all himself. Most of the time he mows and bales by himself but people pick it up in the field for a discount price. Last year he was going to keep it all so he tried to hire locals to pick it up for him. Didn’t work. LOL
TN is miserable in the summer with the near 100 degree temps in late summer and extremely high humidity. Back in the old days, farmers had sons that worked the fields and that was all they did. They were used to it. Nobody wants to work the farms now. They all go out of town or work in the factories. That leaves migrants. I don’t have a problem with the documented migrants but the illegals have got to go!
I had a truck farm outside Memphis in the 1970’s and could never find pickers.
Not a new problem.
Stop welfare checks.
Either transportation costs (gasoline around $3.60 a gallon) or lodging costs, as well as the transitory nature of farm labor (big demand at fitting/planting, big demand at harvest, little in between) means this will continue to be a problem.
Let’s take all the white-collar automotive engineers who were laid off from Ford and make them pick cherries.
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