3 ms·

Maybe they have been faced with the prospect of moving to a city and working in an office.

mywittyname 9y ago
These people are in their 50-60s. That's not a likely transition. A few might be able to get into sales or traveling trade work. But most of them are going to have a difficult time finding any sort of work. Agism and the stigma of being a bumpkin/luddite will absolutely work against them.
- alistairSH 9y ago
  stigma of being a bumpkin/Luddite Which is a terrible assumption to make. Many farmers (at least here in the mid-Atlantic) are college-educated absolutely not bumpkins/Luddites. Unsurprisingly, agricultural programs have a useful blend of business/economics and science.
  - roel_v 9y ago
    That's why it's called a 'stigma' - a reputation, not a fact.
    - alistairSH 9y ago
      Yes, I was agreeing with you.
  - swayvil 9y ago
    On the flipside consider the stigma of the office worker, aka scriviner. Pale, unhealthy, tortured, drained, doomed to live in a mechanistic hellhive. The farmer believes death is a better fate.
- jandrese 9y ago
  On a side note, this is the heart of how Democrats managed to lose the last Presidential election. Telling 50 year old machinists and farmers that they should get government assistance to get a loan to learn computer programming because their job moved to Mexico is much less palatable than the guy who will call the president of the company and tell them not to close the factory.
  - linkregister 9y ago
    The numbers of votes for the current president were not remarkably higher than for the Republican candidate in 2012. The remarkable difference was a loss of votes for the Democratic candidate compared to 2012. I do agree that Democrats should be more inclusive and less impractical with the issues they take, and it's a valuable lesson. However, they should bear in mind the reality of what happened: they fielded an unexpectedly unpopular candidate and the votes show it.

These people are in their 50-60s. That's not a likely transition. A few might be able to get into sales or traveling trade work. But most of them are going to have a difficult time finding any sort of work. Agism and the stigma of being a bumpkin/luddite will absolutely work against them.

alistairSH 9y ago
stigma of being a bumpkin/Luddite Which is a terrible assumption to make. Many farmers (at least here in the mid-Atlantic) are college-educated absolutely not bumpkins/Luddites. Unsurprisingly, agricultural programs have a useful blend of business/economics and science.
- roel_v 9y ago
  That's why it's called a 'stigma' - a reputation, not a fact.
  - alistairSH 9y ago
    Yes, I was agreeing with you.
- swayvil 9y ago
  On the flipside consider the stigma of the office worker, aka scriviner. Pale, unhealthy, tortured, drained, doomed to live in a mechanistic hellhive. The farmer believes death is a better fate.
jandrese 9y ago
On a side note, this is the heart of how Democrats managed to lose the last Presidential election. Telling 50 year old machinists and farmers that they should get government assistance to get a loan to learn computer programming because their job moved to Mexico is much less palatable than the guy who will call the president of the company and tell them not to close the factory.
- linkregister 9y ago
  The numbers of votes for the current president were not remarkably higher than for the Republican candidate in 2012. The remarkable difference was a loss of votes for the Democratic candidate compared to 2012. I do agree that Democrats should be more inclusive and less impractical with the issues they take, and it's a valuable lesson. However, they should bear in mind the reality of what happened: they fielded an unexpectedly unpopular candidate and the votes show it.