4 ms·

Maybe if we could pay citizens fair market price for their labor we wouldn't have to rely on illegal immigrants.

sabujp 8y ago
how many citizens and legal migrants do you know are going to work in backbreaking conditions picking the food you eat for minimum wage? Cheap robots haven't caught up yet to pick and grow everything we need. Also note that not everyone can pay whole food prices
- mdorazio 8y ago
  If they got paid a living wage to do it with reasonable hours? A huge number. Would that mean food would get more expensive? Yes. Is that a bad thing? No.
- oh_sigh 8y ago
  OP said "market price for their labor", not minimum wage. If there is no one willing to do the labor for minimum wage, then minimum wage is not the market price for that labor. When you can't afford to pay necessary labor costs for a product, the answer isn't to go to the black market.
- danablast 8y ago
  Thank God for those illegal immigrants. Without them we would all have starved I guess.
- koolba 8y ago
  I’ve thought about this quite a bit. California min wage is $11/hour. Let’s say that the market rate for legal worker labor that’s going to work the fields is double that, that still seems like it’d be affordable. It’s not like labor is 100% of the cost of produce. There’s seed, fertilizer, packaging, transport. I’d be surprised if labor was even 25% of the wholesale cost. Yes it’d be more expensive but I don’t think it’d be prohibitively so.
- taobility 8y ago
  Please get out of California, especially SV, and go to mid-US, there are so many US citizens can't afford daily food.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
- hindsightbias 8y ago
  Someone should forward this to the current Ag Secretary: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/07/31/634442195/when-the-u-s-government-tried-to-replace-migrant-farmworkers-with-high-schoolers https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/07/31/634442195/wh...
- imperialyuma 8y ago
  Throwaway because I don’t want this associated with me publically. I grew up in the Imperial Valley, California and graduated from CUHS the year after the recession hit. At the time I had no prospects, I wasn’t a software developer, I didn’t have the grades or money for college outside IVC and neither did many of my classmates. No fewer than 7-10 people my age, my class, were working the fields nearby the winter after graduation, all US citizens most at least 2nd generation, 2-3 pochos that couldn’t even speak Spanish. It wasn’t good money, but it was money that was available without having leave/stop helping your family and move to San Diego and pay San Diego rent, food, transport, and moving prices for some shitty job at a Cici’s Pizza while living in a 2 bed/1 bathroom apartment with 4 other people and trying to catch classes at grossmont, city, Mesa etc simultaneously. Many people would take that opportunity, you just don’t know any of us.
  - atomi 8y ago
    Yeah I bet, just not enough to meet the demand.

how many citizens and legal migrants do you know are going to work in backbreaking conditions picking the food you eat for minimum wage? Cheap robots haven't caught up yet to pick and grow everything we need. Also note that not everyone can pay whole food prices

mdorazio 8y ago
If they got paid a living wage to do it with reasonable hours? A huge number. Would that mean food would get more expensive? Yes. Is that a bad thing? No.
oh_sigh 8y ago
OP said "market price for their labor", not minimum wage. If there is no one willing to do the labor for minimum wage, then minimum wage is not the market price for that labor. When you can't afford to pay necessary labor costs for a product, the answer isn't to go to the black market.
danablast 8y ago
Thank God for those illegal immigrants. Without them we would all have starved I guess.
koolba 8y ago
I’ve thought about this quite a bit. California min wage is $11/hour. Let’s say that the market rate for legal worker labor that’s going to work the fields is double that, that still seems like it’d be affordable. It’s not like labor is 100% of the cost of produce. There’s seed, fertilizer, packaging, transport. I’d be surprised if labor was even 25% of the wholesale cost. Yes it’d be more expensive but I don’t think it’d be prohibitively so.
taobility 8y ago
Please get out of California, especially SV, and go to mid-US, there are so many US citizens can't afford daily food.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
hindsightbias 8y ago
Someone should forward this to the current Ag Secretary: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/07/31/634442195/when-the-u-s-government-tried-to-replace-migrant-farmworkers-with-high-schoolers https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/07/31/634442195/wh...
imperialyuma 8y ago
Throwaway because I don’t want this associated with me publically. I grew up in the Imperial Valley, California and graduated from CUHS the year after the recession hit. At the time I had no prospects, I wasn’t a software developer, I didn’t have the grades or money for college outside IVC and neither did many of my classmates. No fewer than 7-10 people my age, my class, were working the fields nearby the winter after graduation, all US citizens most at least 2nd generation, 2-3 pochos that couldn’t even speak Spanish. It wasn’t good money, but it was money that was available without having leave/stop helping your family and move to San Diego and pay San Diego rent, food, transport, and moving prices for some shitty job at a Cici’s Pizza while living in a 2 bed/1 bathroom apartment with 4 other people and trying to catch classes at grossmont, city, Mesa etc simultaneously. Many people would take that opportunity, you just don’t know any of us.
- atomi 8y ago
  Yeah I bet, just not enough to meet the demand.