Trump proposes aid to farmers by... slashing farmworker wages

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

White House Seeks To Lower Farmworker Pay To Help Agriculture Industry

(Franco Ordonez, NPR, April 10, 2020)

New White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows is working with Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue to see how to reduce wage rates for foreign guest workers on American farms, in order to help U.S. farmers struggling during the coronavirus, according to U.S. officials and sources familiar with the plans.

Opponents of the plan argue it will hurt vulnerable workers and depress domestic wages.

The measure is the latest effort being pushed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to help U.S farmers who say they are struggling amid disruptions in the agricultural supply chain compounded by the outbreak; the industry was already hurting because of President Trump's tariff war with China.

[...]

These cartoon villains don't even have a definite plan for how they will strip workers of their pay, but they are determined to find a way.

It's unclear how the reforms would be made, including whether they would be taken through executive action or through the federal regulatory process. But [Agriculture Secretary] Perdue has pushed for adjusting what is known as the adverse effect wage rate, which prevents farmers using the H-2A program from paying all workers — U.S. and guest workers — wages below the prevailing rates in the surrounding area.

[...]

The "adverse effect wage rates" are based on a USDA survey of what agricultural workers are paid in each state. It's $11.71 in Florida, $12.67 in North Carolina and $14.77 in California.

What the hell is wrong with these people?

Even if you thought that this was the best way to deliver aid to farmers (although the administration provided cash bailouts to farmers to ameliorate losses due to the trade wars so obviously this isn't something they necessarily reject on principle), why the hell would you try to cut out income to consumers who plow that money back into local economies? These people buy food and pay rent and utilities just like any other American and most rural areas already are more economically stagnant than other areas of the country.

This is unconscionable. There is no plausible denial that these people are evil.

[PSOL]

I’m almost sure that the Farmworkers that are American citizens will be disproportionately more affected then naturalized residents or undocumented immigrants due to threat and coercion THAT I ACTUALLY POINTED OUT BEFORE. Trump is really saving agricultural jobs for reel Murikans.

[ProudModerate2]

I'm starting to think that trump really is the Anti-Christ.

[brucejoel99]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

[dead0man]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

they aren't slaves, they can chose to not come here.  It would make some of our food cost more if we actually had to pay Americans to do it, maybe that's a net good, I don't know.

[brucejoel99]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

they aren't slaves, they can chose to not come here.  It would make some of our food cost more if we actually had to pay Americans to do it, maybe that's a net good, I don't know.

"Serf's up!"

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

they aren't slaves, they can chose to not come here.  It would make some of our food cost more if we actually had to pay Americans to do it, maybe that's a net good, I don't know.

From the article:

Last month, the U.S. State Department said it will start processing more applicants seeking H-2A temporary guest worker visas to ensure U.S. farmers have foreign workers in time for spring planting.

If Americans were so eager to do the work at the "above-grade" rate then why did the State Department spend the last month luring in workers to work at a rate that the administration knew they would consider cutting?

Notice that nobody is asking for these jobs to be cut, they're just asking to be able to pay these people less. They value the work, they just don't think the people doing it are worth the cost.

[dead0man]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

they aren't slaves, they can chose to not come here.  It would make some of our food cost more if we actually had to pay Americans to do it, maybe that's a net good, I don't know.

From the article:

Last month, the U.S. State Department said it will start processing more applicants seeking H-2A temporary guest worker visas to ensure U.S. farmers have foreign workers in time for spring planting.

If Americans were so eager to do the work at the "above-grade" rate then why did the State Department spend the last month luring in workers to work at a rate that the administration knew they would consider cutting?

Notice that nobody is asking for these jobs to be cut, they're just asking to be able to pay these people less. They value the work, they just don't think the people doing it are worth the cost.

that, it could be argued, is because we've grown accustomed to our current situation that was brought about and clearly favored by money and works against the American poor by taking away hundreds of thousands of jobs they used to do.  If we only had American workers working American fields, maybe they'd pay a reasonable amount...or maybe it would have killed most of our farming?  I don't know.

Just playing devil's advocate here (and I'm certainly not arguing for the benefit of "Big Farm"), tell me where I'm wrong.

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

they aren't slaves, they can chose to not come here.  It would make some of our food cost more if we actually had to pay Americans to do it, maybe that's a net good, I don't know.

From the article:

Last month, the U.S. State Department said it will start processing more applicants seeking H-2A temporary guest worker visas to ensure U.S. farmers have foreign workers in time for spring planting.

If Americans were so eager to do the work at the "above-grade" rate then why did the State Department spend the last month luring in workers to work at a rate that the administration knew they would consider cutting?

Notice that nobody is asking for these jobs to be cut, they're just asking to be able to pay these people less. They value the work, they just don't think the people doing it are worth the cost.

that, it could be argued, is because we've grown accustomed to our current situation that was brought about and clearly favored by money and works against the American poor by taking away hundreds of thousands of jobs they used to do.  If we only had American workers working American fields, maybe they'd pay a reasonable amount...or maybe it would have killed most of our farming?  I don't know.

Just playing devil's advocate here (and I'm certainly not arguing for the benefit of "Big Farm"), tell me where I'm wrong.

I guess? IDK, that horse left the barn decades ago.

Farm work (as well as a lot of packing, processing, etc.) is gruesome work. After the Postville Raid in Iowa (when a plant workforce of mostly Central American immigrants were deported) the packing plant operators brought in poor native-born workers from Ohio, Michigan, Texas, and Minnesota. Very few of them lasted more than a month.

You could make the point that that's due to a non-unionized and degraded workforce not being in a position to fight for workforce protections, but again, horse out of the barn. Certainly seems like farmers shouldn't get rescued off the backs of workers who are still going to be working for them, especially if they were brought in to work under the promise of a higher wage. That's predatory.

The owner of the Postville plant who oversaw the raid died last month of COVID, for what it's worth.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

I'm starting to think that trump really is the Anti-Christ.

Do you really expect us to believe the Devil would lower himself to Mr Trump's level?

[DINGO Joe]

Farmworkers are already exempt from minimum wage & overtime laws. What's next - asking the workers to pay for the privilege of working on a farm?

they aren't slaves, they can chose to not come here.  It would make some of our food cost more if we actually had to pay Americans to do it, maybe that's a net good, I don't know.

From the article:

Last month, the U.S. State Department said it will start processing more applicants seeking H-2A temporary guest worker visas to ensure U.S. farmers have foreign workers in time for spring planting.

If Americans were so eager to do the work at the "above-grade" rate then why did the State Department spend the last month luring in workers to work at a rate that the administration knew they would consider cutting?

Notice that nobody is asking for these jobs to be cut, they're just asking to be able to pay these people less. They value the work, they just don't think the people doing it are worth the cost.

that, it could be argued, is because we've grown accustomed to our current situation that was brought about and clearly favored by money and works against the American poor by taking away hundreds of thousands of jobs they used to do.  If we only had American workers working American fields, maybe they'd pay a reasonable amount...or maybe it would have killed most of our farming?  I don't know.

Just playing devil's advocate here (and I'm certainly not arguing for the benefit of "Big Farm"), tell me where I'm wrong.

I don't know how much of the work was ever done by the American poor.  I mean, there certainly was sharecropping in the deep South, which doesn't seem terribly desirable.  In the north and Midwest it was smaller farms and family labor that did much of the work.  Yes, some townspeople might work a second job by helping at harvest time ( my postmaster grandfather would).  Out west, the migrant worker circuit has been around for a long time. 

Huge chunks of ag these days are for export or ethanol so I too don't know how much would be killed off by paying a living wage.   And then there are our current Covid  infested meat packing plants which have also been dominated by immigrants since Upton Sinclair days.

[ProudModerate2]

I'm starting to think that trump really is the Anti-Christ.

Do you really expect us to believe the Devil would lower himself to Mr Trump's level?