Good riddance: California growers moving operations to Mexico

Posted Tue, Sep 4, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Please extend your right hand, palm outstretched, then slowly move it a few millimeters back and forth as we all wave good bye, good riddance to some California growers who've moved their operations to Mexico ("U.S. farmers go where workers are: Mexico" by Julia Preston of the New York Times).

There's a "sense of crisis" among growers over supposed attempts to enforce our laws. Only one (1) hacendado economic expat grower is quoted (Steve Scaroni of Valley Harvesting and Packing) although Tom Nassif of Western Growers claims that twelve large companies employ 11,000 in Mexico. Scaroni "surmises that many of his [U.S.] workers have presented false documents". His Mexican workers get $11 a day versus about $9 an hour in the U.S.
...Precise statistics are not readily available on American farming in Mexico, because growers seek to maintain a low profile for their operations abroad. But Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, displayed a map on the Senate floor in July locating more than 46,000 acres, or about 18,500 hectares, that American growers are cultivating in just two Mexican states, Guanajuato and Baja California.

[...possible security risk from importing foreign crops, supposed loss of higher-wage jobs of those higher up the food chain...]

...Some academics say warnings of a farm labor debacle are exaggerated. "By and large, the most dire predictions don't come true," said Philip Martin, an agricultural economist at the University of California, Davis.

...However, some recent studies suggest that strains on the farm labor supply are real. Steve Levy, an economist at the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy in Palo Alto, compared unemployed Americans with illegal immigrant workers in the labor market. "The bottom line," he concluded, "is that most unemployed workers are not available to replace fired unauthorized immigrant workers," in part because very few of the unemployed are in farm work.
Obviously, just because someone has done one thing in the past doesn't mean they can't do something else, so I tend to suspect his study was designed to obtain a specific conclusion. As for the security risk of importing food, it's definitely there. However, the security risk of having millions of foreign citizens here is much greater. And, I wonder what would happen to any growers who were caught employing illegal labor from Central America. I wouldn't doubt that they're tempted, since they'd probably work for even less than $11 a day. Of course, Mexico and its citizens might take a different view of that type of activity than our elites do here.

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dianne feinstein

Comments

Tanstaafl (not verified)

Tue, 09/04/2007 - 22:30

Buh bye. Unfortunately the Chicken Littles will be backed up by a media that will pin any negative economic news on those mean-spirited nativists. Just as they currently hide the outrageous external costs of our "cheap" invader labor. Don't expect reality to discredit these people. Look what Ted Kennedy said about immigration in 1965 and what really happened. He's still in office crafting immigration policy. There is no justice.

Smitty (not verified)

Wed, 09/05/2007 - 00:33

this is a predictible effect of open borders & globalization, I would expect US to lose a huge portion of our labor intensive hand-picked fruit & vegetable market share. Theoretically we'll make up the losses with higher or equal value exports in something we produce more efficiently like corn or wheat or autos or jet airplanes. Duh, this is a good thing, the only problem is we need to deport all the unneeded excess Mexican laborers-maintain our "flexibility" like Sir Alan Greenspan lauds.

D Flinchum (not verified)

Wed, 09/05/2007 - 10:14

"The bottom line," he concluded, "is that most unemployed workers are not available to replace fired unauthorized immigrant workers," in part because very few of the unemployed are in farm work. Apparently a lot of the AgWorkers granted amnesty in 1986 weren't "in farm work" either. The fraud rate is estimated at 70%. My particular favorite story is the Indian motel owner who was in the US illegally. (I assume he overstayed a visa.) He worked the required number of days needed to get his papers, then went back to his motel.