2周前

Multiple Texas Farms Shut Down After ‘Almost 100%’ Of Workforce Vanishes Overnight | animalplanethq.com

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/32291701

The reason is simple: an increase in immigration enforcement, including high-profile ICE raids, shook Texas farm workers to their core. The news filtered fast that workers—regardless of legal status—chose safety over a salary.
Farmers, who had been working with their crews for decades, described the loss as “devastating” and “unprecedented.” This is alarming as most farms are founded upon immigrant labor, both legal and illegal, creating a domino effect for the food system as a whole.
. . . When farm workers vanish, the effects are felt far beyond the fields. Livestock is untended, crops go unpicked, food production declines, and food prices dramatically increase. In Texas alone, where specialty vegetables and fruits must be hand-picked, worker shortages jeopardize entire harvest seasons.
This results in fewer foods on grocery store shelves, higher prices for families nationwide, and a greater reliance on imports. Threads on Reddit and YouTube are already predicting price hikes and empty produce shelves.

United States | News & Politics @midwest.social

Optional @lemmy.world

2周前

Multiple Texas Farms Shut Down After ‘Almost 100%’ Of Workforce Vanishes Overnight | animalplanethq.com

animalplanethq.com /multiple-texas-farms-shut-down-after-almost-100-of-workforce-vanishes-overnight/

70 评论

The Texas farmers....."How can Biden do this to us?"
- Every single one of these people in every story still supports Trump. Makes no sense.
  
  Cult
  
  I think it boils down to this....
  Hardcore MAGA can't admit when they're wrong. These are the parents that never say sorry to their kids. They are ALWAYS right. They will be homeless on the street before Trump did this to them. They're team players, not individuals with a compass.
  Just sheep.
  
  Cipolla explains why, see rule 3 and also why you don't understand, see rule 4
  These are Cipolla's five fundamental laws of stupidity:
  Always and inevitably, everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.
  The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.
  A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.
  Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular, non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places, and under any circumstances, to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.
  A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.
- Thanks Obama.
Have the day you voted for, Texas.
- Ironic that about 40% of them didn't vote, so I sincerely hope those 40% are getting rat fucked like the rest of us who voted for sanity are.
This is the ultimate Texan dog-that-caught-the-car moment. I remember talking about this in school in Texas 25 years ago when Republicans were complaining about immigration. Several students brought up that the farms are all tended by "seasonal workers," which meant immigrant labor, so what was the Republican answer to that? They didn't have one, of course, not a realistic one. It was the same talking points then as now of "American workers" filling the gap, and even then those jobs didn't pay a living wage, so no American would take them. I bet they pay worse now.
They had 25 years to figure this out, but of course they had no intention of figuring it out.
- They're gonna arrest the immigrant farm workers and then lease them right back to the same farms as slaves.
  
  There it is. This is how the money flows. Private prison labor.
- They didn’t have one, of course, not a realistic one.
  When I try to have discussions around this I often take elements of their language and point out that market forces make it unattractive for citizens to work there, but it can be good for immigrants. Sometimes they get it, but often too indoctrinated into the republican party to act differently.
Very predictable result of criminalizing the people who do the work.
a corporation that cannot pay labor what it requires (ie the market) should choose: shut down or shut down. profit is stolen wage, too. So… yeah.
Remember kids: corporations are not people. Unlike babies, corporations can be thrown out with the bath water.
Pay labor a living wage or get fucked.
- Totally get it, super on board, but uh, to circle back to the here and now for a second, we kinda need food? So the situation as it is right now really blows.
  Some people are joking about $70 salads, but also there is a point in there. Farming sucks ass a job and if you paid people enough to incentivise folks to do it, that's something not a lot of farmers can do, especially small ones.
  So what would an ideal solution be with the technology we have now?
  
  Syndicalism. Farmers co-ops. Food from your lawn.
- Done. Your salad is now $74.99
  
  Sounds like capitalism has failed then at that point. Seize the means brother.
  
  if that’s what means labor gets a living wage (which also assumes I get one), and the corporation makes no profit and the workers own the means of production- cool!
  
  https://menuprice.co/dk/mcdonalds-menu
  
  Cows eat salad....here's your $3900.99 double McChicken, 1/4 pounder delight with bacon bits sir! It's served over a Mexican cheese platen...oh don't eat the platen! That's just to keep the moisture in!
Funny how no part of the article mentioned hundreds of eager American workers rushing into those farm jobs. Nor the farmers/ranchers deciding they'd have to raise their prices and their pay rates.
That's probably because markets aren't going to pay more for the crops, and nobody wants to work that hard except people with no other options.
- It's the same thing after brexit. I cant find the source anymore. But something like 6000 non-immigrants signed up for farm work and only like ten showed up. And none stayed longer than two days. So it's not like they didn't have a recent example of how this would turn out.
Farmers will never learn, those people are the only ones willing to do the work. White kids have been raised that that work is beneath them
- It isn't beneath me. I just don't think I could physically do it as a job. Also, the pay is bad. So, it's pretty low on my job list. I'd rather work a fast food job. And I never want to work one again.
  
  Not good lay plus that job sucks, it's beneath you.
- That yes, but also more.
  One positive aspect of social media is showing the young how the world really works, to an extent I think.
  Poor immigrants are generally in a more uninformed and desperate survival situation. Many probably aren't of the mindset "fuck slaving away 14hrs a day for shit pay to make a billionaire richer". They just generally don't think that way yet.
  I personally would rather die than be forced to work in those conditions. I sympathize with them and wish they didn't have to either. But they're still currently the ones more desperate and willing to suffer.
  I would be willing to help with farm work however, if the pay was significantly better, 4-6hrs per day, 2-3 days per week. But normalizing this would necessitate eradicating billionaires and even hundred millionaires. Obviously not gonna happen.
  I'm just sayin' it's more than just white kids are lazy. At least I hope so.
- Disagree. There are plenty of people who would do the work, they're just not willing to do it for the amount farmers are willing to pay.
  Also, you'd have to be insane to do outside work in both Florida and Texas, now that both states have got rid of mandated water breaks for outdoor workers.
  
  Not to mention going there. Except for people desperate for work, who in their right mind would travel to magastan out in the country m, to shave away with no water or bathroom breaks, in the hot sun all day without even water for minimum wage? There are just so many reasons for an immediate no
- Nice try, racist. Stop splitting the working class up like that. Labor should be paid a living wage and any corp what cannot do that should fail. Race of the worker is irrelevant.
  Capitalists have you convinced it is different between races but only because that distraction keeps capitalists exploiting the working class folk.
  Ain’t no war but class war.
This is not a problem for big ag. That's why no regional or national ag-orgs are complaining. This is not a face eating leopard moment, sadly.
Campaneros still need to work. The pattern at the moment is they stay away for a few days after a raid, but then return. This benefits their bosses. Previously there were work stoppages to pressure bosses to raise the $/piece rate. Not now.
Plus the regime has promised to replace the workers lost to their ethnic cleansing campaign with an expanded H2a visa program - after having stripped away many of the already meager protections against wage theft.
The plantation lords know they're getting cheaper, more exploitable labor.
I was talking to a friend there and he told me people in the suburbs are having trouble getting their lawns mowed now. So glad I got out of there.
Ain't you redneck chucklefucks glad you voted red? Enjoy losing your farm.
To all those farmers, the only thing I could possibly say is,
“I hope you have the day you voted for”.
But where did the workers go?
- “Where did the lighter fluid come from?”
It'd be funny if it wasn't going to affect the rest of the population that didn't vote for a psychotic nutjob.
Does this mean we will see unemployment numbers go down in the coming weeks/months?
I’m not asking with any agenda, I’m just curious if it will end up measured in that way.
- I don't think undocumented people are included in labor statistics.
  So I don't think this will look bad on paper. No farmers are prepared to pay fair wages to staff so it's most likely good food will sit in fields and rot as the prices rise at the supermarket.
  
  I wonder whether the seasonal workers are included either. The legal workers are likely staying away and you can’t be unemployed if you’re only there with a job
"BAW-HA-HA-HA" - Canada.
- Haha... Until you remember that we get most of our fresh produce from the States we are going to pay for this in the end.
  
  Not true for me in PEI. We are actively NOT buying US products. It really hasn't been a problem at all for us at this point.
  The only fresh produce we've had a problem getting is sweet onions and lettuce (sometimes). We can get red and white onions from mexico and other locations, just the sweet ones come from the states. I'm sure this will change over the growing season.
  We're setting up a rig to grow our own lettuce and a few other things year round.
The funny thing is that with Trump sabotaging the US dollar migrant labor may just stop being a thing on it's own.
I hope we see more of this and the farmers that voted red, feel the pain they voted for. I don’t care if it cause a bigger issue. At this point I’m ready to rebuild America
At least it's not just farms in California.

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