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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] we'll have to confront the farm-labor crisis

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  • From: Liz <liz@allslash.org>
  • To: <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] we'll have to confront the farm-labor crisis
  • Date: Sun, 01 Jun 2008 08:57:57 -0400

At 02:30 PM 5/31/2008, you wrote:
 
Why do US citizens not want to do this kind of work?  The work is tedious and the pay is low, but it's honest labor for a good cause.
 

Well--as Dean pointed out, you can't feed your family on those wages.

But I think there's another answer too. There has been such an emphasis on getting a college degree that pure and simple labor is not seen as dignified any more. This is another example of unintended outcomes. The original motivation was to increase the overall level of education, and to encourage people who would benefit from it but whose families might not have a history of higher education. But we Americans just go overboard with everything. If a college education was good, then everybody ought to have one, right? Never mind that some people really can't do college level work, or that many people would far rather learn a trade than sit in a classroom. Working with your hands became something you did only if you couldn't do any better, and that's a real shame.

Perhaps we have an opportunity now to show that raising food is as essential and dignified a job as any other. I certainly have good memories of the days my family spent in the fields and orchards when I was young. It also taught me that I could have things my family couldn't buy for me if I earned the money for them. I badly wanted a camera, but there was no way they could buy that for an eight-year-old. So I picked those prunes off the ground (yes, that is how "prunes" are picked), and made enough money to buy one myself. It was a lesson I never forgot, and probably contributed to the fact that I've been self-employed most of my life.

Liz in SW VA
http://life-as-a-spectator-sport.com


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