People forget that we once had a “humane” policy, it was called the Bracero program. It was destroyed by Cesar Chavez who swore we had Americans who could do the job that Braceros signed up for. We didn’t. The result was that Food Machinery Corporation began to conceive picking machines. Hybridized seeds reduced the picking time. But, we still needed field hands. In California, once thousands of students worked the summer in the melon fields of the Imperial Valley, the grape sheds around Bakersfield, the canneries from Hayward on south. The minimum wage ended that. Like it or not, we will need Latino pickers and field hands for decades to come. And that means from the apple orchards of western Carolina to the apple orchards of the Yakima Valley. They should be scheduled and they should be treated humanely, and there is nothing wrong with saying so.
“Like it or not, we will need Latino pickers and field hands for decades to come.”
That’s racist. Are you WASPS too lazy to do your own outside work?
We’ve never had a “humane” policy when it comes to migrant field workers. Just so you know, I used to pick strawberries in the Capristrano Valley, CA, nearly 50 years ago. The Mexicans were hostile towards American field workers then, and they’re certainly more so today.
I disagree that we need foreigners coming here to work in the fields. We need farmers who will stop planting crops requiring hand picking.
I now only buy locally grown produce here in southwest Washington State or grow my own. That is an increasing trend and with the price of transportaion soaring due to gasoline prices, it shows no sign of abating.
If we don’t discontinue bringing in Mexican field workers, then Mexico will follow through with their nearly century and a half desire to take back the western half of the United States.