🚀 go-pugleaf

On 3 Nov 2006 06:14:19 -0800, trader4@optonline.net wrote:

>
>Brent P wrote:
>> In article <eiffqa$rnk$1@f04n12.cac.psu.edu>, Elmo wrote:
>>
>> > Low wages paid to ag workers are one way to subsidize low food prices.
>> > Think what food would cost if the people who produce, prepare, and serve
>> > it actually got paid living wages.
>>
>> Low wages prevent the use of automation. Only those crops where
>> automation has not yet been developed and/or growers simply refuse to
>> use it because of the cheap labor supply depend on illegal alien
>> workers. There wouldn't be any increase in price unless the producers
>> threw a fit and stopped growing the crops. The market price is what is.
>
>Not according to basic economics.  If automation was less expensive for
>the crops labor is now being used for, the farmers would be using it
>already, instead of illegal aliens.   When you raise all producers
>costs, the supply curve shifts, resulting in a higher market price.
>And no matter how much automation you have, there are still many tasks,
>like inspection/grading, that have to be done by humans.
>
>Now, does that mean it would result in prices so high people could no
>longer afford food?   No, but it most certainly would have the effect
>of increasing price.
>

Well, if you figure a normal human can pick on average
12 tomatos a minute, and you raise his wage to 
$15 an hour, that works out to a whopping $0.02 per
tomato.   I'm pretty sure that THAT difference isn't
going to cause me to starve to death. 

The problem is that the labor market isn't an 
instant-response system. When you disrupt it
by yanking a couple million people out of the
pool, it takes *TIME* for the market to adjust.
And if you've got 2 weeks to pick your crop, 
you don't HAVE that time.   Which means the 
first year or two after a cutoff of illegal 
alien labor is likely to be ugly, and the 
more marginal producers may well go under 
before they can adapt.   

I find that that prospect doesn't bother
me as much as it probably should, but if
someone wanted to propose interest-free
government loans for three years while
the market sorted itself out, I wouldn't
argue too hard against it.

--Goedjn