4 ms·

Crab crisis: Maryland seafood industry loses 40% of workforce in visa lottery

22 points by petethomas 9y ago

TabTwo 9y ago
Let’s make crabs great again!
CoolAndComposed 9y ago
Crabbing companies cannot reliably exploit cheap labor this year, whereas other companies will be able to for the first time, in a lottery system (for cheap labor). Seems ok to me.
EliRivers 9y ago
So what happens? I would hypothesize that one possible result is that the price of crabmeat goes up until it becomes economical to ship the crabs overseas for picking, and then shipped back for selling (maybe it already is, and there was just no reason to change the system until now). That's happened in other cases and it's effectively a way to move a factory abroad, with a larger chunk of the money involved also moving abroad. A worse outcome for the local citizen. Alternatively, I suppose the wages demanded by local citizens could go down enough to be able to compete. I wonder how low that would be.
- gowld 9y ago
  That may adversely impact quality and desirability of the meat. The costs of transportation will also pay transportation workers. Also, it depends on the prior competitiveness of the crabmeat market -- was it a sellers' market (prices are already at a maximum) or a buyers' market (prices at a minimum)
- rlpb 9y ago
  > it becomes economical to ship the crabs overseas for picking, and then shipped back for selling If their goal here is to stop importing labor, then a government that wants to prevent that outcome could simply impose a tariff on processed crabmeat.
angmarsbane 9y ago
Is there a process for the Division of Unemployment or for temp companies to get matched to local companies that don't get the visas they're seeking?
godzillabrennus 9y ago
Costs will go up for consumers to provide enough margin for employers to pay a living wage to a local. The pain of the change will bankrupt small businesses and get the gop some bad pr.
URSpider94 9y ago
Crab picking is hard work, and requires a lot of skill to do quickly and without getting bits of shell in the meat. Not just anyone off the street can walk in and do the job. These businesses are built around a decades-long, 100% legal, guest worker program that suddenly failed them. In addition, the lack of pickers harms not just the picking businesses, but also all the watermen who fish for crabs. To compound the issue, these businesses are located in rural areas where there just aren’t very many people around to do the work. And, this is seasonal work - anyone local who takes the job will be laid off in the Fall, and then won’t come back next year (because they will have found another job, ideally), so their training is lost.

22 points by petethomas 9y ago

Let’s make crabs great again!

Crabbing companies cannot reliably exploit cheap labor this year, whereas other companies will be able to for the first time, in a lottery system (for cheap labor). Seems ok to me.

EliRivers 9y ago

So what happens? I would hypothesize that one possible result is that the price of crabmeat goes up until it becomes economical to ship the crabs overseas for picking, and then shipped back for selling (maybe it already is, and there was just no reason to change the system until now). That's happened in other cases and it's effectively a way to move a factory abroad, with a larger chunk of the money involved also moving abroad. A worse outcome for the local citizen. Alternatively, I suppose the wages demanded by local citizens could go down enough to be able to compete. I wonder how low that would be.

gowld 9y ago
That may adversely impact quality and desirability of the meat. The costs of transportation will also pay transportation workers. Also, it depends on the prior competitiveness of the crabmeat market -- was it a sellers' market (prices are already at a maximum) or a buyers' market (prices at a minimum)
rlpb 9y ago
> it becomes economical to ship the crabs overseas for picking, and then shipped back for selling If their goal here is to stop importing labor, then a government that wants to prevent that outcome could simply impose a tariff on processed crabmeat.

angmarsbane 9y ago

Is there a process for the Division of Unemployment or for temp companies to get matched to local companies that don't get the visas they're seeking?

godzillabrennus 9y ago

Costs will go up for consumers to provide enough margin for employers to pay a living wage to a local. The pain of the change will bankrupt small businesses and get the gop some bad pr.

URSpider94 9y ago

Crab picking is hard work, and requires a lot of skill to do quickly and without getting bits of shell in the meat. Not just anyone off the street can walk in and do the job. These businesses are built around a decades-long, 100% legal, guest worker program that suddenly failed them. In addition, the lack of pickers harms not just the picking businesses, but also all the watermen who fish for crabs. To compound the issue, these businesses are located in rural areas where there just aren’t very many people around to do the work. And, this is seasonal work - anyone local who takes the job will be laid off in the Fall, and then won’t come back next year (because they will have found another job, ideally), so their training is lost.