Poor Migrant Farm Workers

Unfortunately, there is a lack of awareness about trafficking of Latino immigrants, especially farm workers. This worsens the problem. Working without pay occurs regularly and getting paid less than promised is also common for undocumented migrants. Owners often “disappear” at the end of the working season and do not pay their workers. Farmers themselves often pay money out of their own earnings to “pay for safety materials and tools” needed to do the job. They are not provided with adequate protection and if they want it, they have to provide for themselves. (Barrick)

Chinese, Japanese, and Filipinos were all brought in to work, but their low standard of living and attempts to organize caused race riots by the white labor force and subsequent removal of foreign workers from the agricultural industry. The need for cheap labor therefore remained. To fill this void, many Mexican workers were brought in;so many that the white worker could not even live in southern California anymore because the wages were so low. Eventually the Mexican worker population grew so massive that they too began to organize, causing the growers to take action against them with "vigilante terrorism and savagery unbelievable in a civilized state" (pg 54). Eventually Mexican labor was withdrawn as well.

Over the past couple decades the number of undocumented immigrants involved in American agriculture has increased by the hundreds. They have dominated the fields on the west coast and have been put to work in some very harsh conditions. Many people in the US believe that these men, women, and even children are occupying jobs that legal citizens could have. We realize that even though much of our agriculture these days is harvested by modern technologies, a big part of the agriculture’s economy is made up of labor intensive from people, such as harvesting grapes, strawberries, pistachios, raspberries, etcetera. As we dig deeper into this topic we will realize why our agricultural

The “Struggle in the Fields” has always been a controversial issue. In the PBS series, we get to learn how many obstacles came along, when many Filipino farm workers along with Mexican American workers began to demand a change in the fields.

Throughout the era of the great depression, migrant farm workers were put at unfair labor. A man named Cesar Chavez helped migrant farm workers by boycotting the fruit companies they worked for and forming unions for them. The beginning of Chavez’s life, striking and boycotting fruit companies, and his new projects were the biggest impact in changing farm worker’s lives.

Despite harsh working conditions, farmworkers have worked constantly for years due to the need of necessities for their families along with themselves. After thorough investigation, I have come to a conclusion that even after so many years of protesting as well as working diligently, farmworkers still have experienced unacceptable working conditions, however they were not as bad as the past. There was a definite need for a drastic change due to the working conditions of the farmworkers. Conditions may have improved due to the social justices that Cesar Chavez including The 5 Year Strike has gained. As I was comparing both working conditions of today’s farmworkers with farmworkers of other times in history, I have come to find many differences

The farm workers’ rights issues were also a major matter that the Mexican-American Civil Rights Movement dealt with along with the other issues. Mexican-American migrant farm workers had to endure the harsh working conditions while traveling from farm to farm in the United States in search for work. While working, the farm workers tended to be exploited by farm owners while also receiving low wages that kept them below the poverty level (Ramirez). Due to certain

Holmes’ purpose in conducting his fieldwork with the migrant workers (specifically the Triqui of Mexico) of California and Washington fruit agriculture was to gain understanding from a perspective many do not consider and that has not been assessed in this way before. Similarly, the goal of this book was to pass that understanding to the common reader, the average American, those who are affected directly and those who are believe they are unaffected by the migrants of American agriculture—and to distinguish that they are not unaffected. Doing so creates the potential for change, even if by only a small factor like

"Where there 's a will, there 's a way" is a phrase often used here in America and it holds true to all walks of life including migrant workers. The desires range from the simple want to make an honest living to wanting to support the family to just wanting to live the American dream. However, the "way", does not always possess the same innocent light of the optimistic saying. In Eric Schlosser’s article, “In the Strawberry Fields” he discusses exactly that. Immigrants often end up doing the laborious farm work most Americans are unwilling to do with good reason. More specifically, he discusses the working conditions of migrant workers in strawberry fields, one of the most difficult row crops to grow. This work is largely done in California where the farming industry is allowed to bend laws as they please, routinely exploiting the vulnerability of immigrants’ legal states. Though, the concepts of small fruits and workers ' rights are not completely relatable to one another until we move past the happy connotation of the vibrant red, juicy fruit and into the grittier efforts that go into making them what we know in grocery stores. Many of us have the pleasant memories of the cool fruit on warm summer days but this image is quite the opposite to its production. Bent at the waist, hundreds of migrant workers, pick fruits under the sweltering summer sun and it would seem like a way a farming that vanished long ago but it is most certainly here. Though the conditions are worsened

All they wanted was for their family to have a place to live and have food on the table. They would work really long hours usually six days a week or sometimes even seven days a week for very little pay. Most farm workers were undocumented and that means that they were in the United States illegally. Most of them would get paid 40 cents for filling up one bucket of either tomatoes, oranges, or potatoes. Cesar Chavez would see families struggling to buy food and things they needed at home.

Many of the migrant workers were on the brink of starvation and they would take whatever wages they could get even if it sounded o good to be true. The businesses would tout a generally high wage offer and this would give starving people incentive to work to ultimately feed their families. When the fields of the farm come close to running out of product they would dramatically lower wages, and increase the payment needed to buy food. The owners of the farms do not have to worry about moving the people on their land, for they are forced to leave to find another means to earn money and feed their

The factory jobs were controlled by owners and bosses, who showed little regard for workers and their wellbeing. Workers forced themselves into work during even extreme illnesses; one absence or mistake and they might be replaced without question. These low wage jobs came with few benefits and no rights; there was nothing in place that protected the livelihood of the worker. Immigrant’s willingness to work all the time created these conditions.

In the 1960’s through the 1970’s the wage count for farmers was just going up however, at some point that uphill battle to raise wages turned around. Marshall Canz was a civil rights organizer and at a point worked with Chavez in his fight to unionize farm workers. In 2010 he wrote a book called “Why David sometimes Wins: Leadership, Organization, and strategy in the California Farm Worker movement”. In the book he says “In real dollars, the nearly 400,000 farmworkers employed today by California’s $30 billion agricultural industry earn wages 20-25 percent below those paid in the late 1970s”(2010). Today minimum wage has dropped to below the amount it was at before. Therefore the United Farm Workers has possibly had little to no permanent effect on farm workers wages. The newer generation now values self-made success meaning the union has little say in things today. Cesar Chavez helped multiple farmworkers find help in the union. Although in is addressing to the Commonwealth Club of California he talks about child labor and how it is in full swing today. Chavez talks about how “30 percent of Northern California’s garlic harvesters are under-aged children” “Some 800,000 under-aged children work with their families harvesting crops across america” (1984). Child labor is something that has been happening for a

     The working conditions for these immigrants at the meat packing plants were appalling and displayed how badly in need of a change they were. Workers in the factory that did unskilled labor would be paid only somewhere between a mere fifteen to twenty-five cents an hour. They would have to work from early in the morning until it was dark at night, with only a half hour break for lunch. They had no choice but to accept whatever position

are not equal to the value of their labors. Their wages are kept down to the subsistent level in order to maintain profits for the capitalists.