On Thu, 16 Aug 2012 18:26:11 -0500, "HeyBub" wrote:

Jack wrote:

That's true only because illegals would not be around to take the
jobs. I could sell cars cheap if I could pay illegals $4.00 an hour
to build them.

Robots build cars today. At considerably less than $4/hr.

Not sure that's true after amortizing the costs.

In the case of agriculture, the difference is not between $5/hr and $7.25
(if you insist agricultural workers come under the minimum wage). The
difference is between $5/hr and nothing!

At some point in the wage scale, it is cheaper to do away with much of the
manual labor and emply a (admittedly expensive) machine. Obviously there are
harvesters for wheat and corn, but I've seen harvesters for nuts, tomatoes,
and oranges.

At $8/hr for labor, you will.

I've seen a machine that automatically washes, bags, and boxes lettuce. In
this instance, stoop workers cut the lettuce and pitch it into the machine,
which is covering 10-12 rows at a time, with the laborers following along
behind.

This lettuce gizmo has to have cut the work, and the amount of labor,
required by 80%.