JoeSpareBedroom wrote:
"Rudy Canoza" wrote in message
thlink.net...

There are undoubtedly some agricultural functions that can be achieved
either mechanically or by hand labor. If the labor costs rise a little,
from their current artificially depressed lows, machinery would move in.



Erase that idea from your head. Farm machinery manufacturers have been
working for decades to find ways to harvest certain delicate crops. If they
could build such things, farmers would buy them in a heartbeat.

*Some* things are amenable to cultivation and
harvesting by entirely mechanical means, but if the
cost of labor is low enough, it will be used in place
of machinery. If the cost of labor rises enough,
machinery will be used.


Take away migrant labor, and you'd better be ready for your kids to hit the
fields to do the harvesting. Nasty, hot dirty work. It wrecks your back even
if you're young and in shape. I'll bet a year's pay you'd hide your kids in
Canada if our government required that kids put in a year of this type of
work.

Governments in democratic market-oriented societies
don't ever "require" that people do certain tasks,
apart from (occasionally) military service. That's a
pretty stinky red herring you trotted out there.

Europe manages to grow a lot of food, including a lot
for export, without a large pool of illegally resident
farm workers. In addition, an already large and still
growing majority of illegally resident immigrants in
this country do not work in agriculture. We are
increasingly hearing stories of farmers allegedly
unable to get their crops harvested because of labor
shortages, even *with* undocumented immigrants.

The fact is, people are going to have to pay the price
for their food, and that price is probably going to
rise. Nothing inherently wrong with that. People eat
far too much food as it is, and a price rise will get
them to eat less.