JoeSpareBedroom wrote:
"Rudy Canoza" wrote in message
link.net...
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:
"Rudy Canoza" wrote in message
k.net...
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:
"Rudy Canoza" wrote in message
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JoeSpareBedroom wrote:
"Rudy Canoza" wrote in message
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Are you ready for $8.00 per pound lettuce & broccoli?
I doubt it would go that high. I think those two crops, for one
things, are things that *do* lend themselves to more mechanization.
You can stop saying that now. It's getting old, and it is in no way
connected with the reality of how things grow.
I don't care if it's getting "old" or not. It is very *much*
connected with the reality of how some things grow.
Last time I'll type this: 2-3 years back, I got curious about this. I
contacted two farm machinery manufacturers and asked about this.
Identical response: If we could invent machines do address more needs,
you'd see them already. We'd love to, but...." Nobody has yet figured
out how to pick about half of what you see in the produce department.
I don't believe that for vegetables. Corn, beans, peas, carrots,
potatoes - those are all mechanically harvested. Pretty much every root
crop, and every crop where the entire plant is harvested, like the corn
and beans and peas.

A quick web search on "mechanical harvesters" showed a few I wouldn't
have thought existed: for sweet cherries, citrus and olives.


Any gardener can point out 20 vegetables that'll be ruined when handled
roughly.
So, I guess the prices of those things would have to rise as more
expensive domestic labor is used, wouldn't they?

How do you suppose Western Europeans get these crops harvested, given
that they don't have a large pool of illegally resident aliens equal to
some 6-7% of their population to do it? Food prices in Europe are
higher than here, but they're not paying any $8.00 per pound for
broccoli.


How do you think that would affect low income people?
Worse than it would affect higher income people. Most price
increases affect poor people more than rich people.

You're not suggesting that massive illegal immigration is
countenanced as a policy goal of providing cheap food for poor
people, are you?
No, but is sure as hell is the way the economy has been structured
over the past 50-75 years.
The economy has not been "structured" in any such way, and large-scale
illegal immigration has not been going on for any 50-75 years.

Where do you come up with this crap, anyway?


When meat heads wail about throwing out migrant workers, they don't
consider that it'll take quite some time to adjust.
I don't know if it would or wouldn't. Personally, I'm not all that
keen to expel the illegally resident aliens who are here. I want to
stop the flow, and I want to get the citizenship clause of the 14th
amendment to be properly understood to get rid of the phenomenon of
"anchor babies".


The biggest adjustment will be convincing people that someone has to
do "that kind of work",
No such adjustment is needed. People already understand that some
amount of labor is needed in agriculture.


and I don't care WHAT you pay them - you won't be able to accelerate
the cultural adjustment.
What kind of "cultural adjustment" is needed to make people understand
that labor-intensive work needs laborers for the work to get done?
Are you nuts?
I'll tell you what: Ask 20 teenagers if they'd be interested in working
a farm field when it's 93 degrees, and they have to bend over for 10
hours cutting broccoli. Let me know what they say.
It would depend on the wage, wouldn't it?
I doubt it, but that's just me.
Yes, that's just you, thoroughly unfamliar with labor economics.


I know people who refuse to ride a city bus because ya know....there are
(whispering) "those people - the kind that ride buses a lot".
Who can blame them, particularly if they can afford personal
transportation? There *are* a lot of weird people on buses. Who wouldn't
want more control over his environment if he could afford it?


I wonder if they'd want their kids working alongside "those people" for
any amount of money.
If the kids or even adults want an income, and if the wages are high
enough, they'll do it.


Kids can get jobs now, in nice air conditioned places.

They can? All of them? At high wages?

I don't think so.


Why on earth would
they want to work in a field, in the hot sun, getting filthy and swinging a
very sharp knife in the vicinity of their ankles?

Because it pays more, and they didn't get the minimum
wage job handing out tickets at the multi-plex cinema?
Just a guess.