Americans Can’t Pick Fruit?

Or at least that’s what this article claims. Farmers in southern California might be forced to let their crops rot rather than have them picked. Why? Because tighter border security is shrinking the pool of sub-minimum wage laborers. And since there aren’t as many laborers from Mexico coming to pick fruit the fruit won’t get picked. Last time I checked Americans and Mexicans had roughly the same anatomy: two hands, two arms, two legs, etc. which can just as easily be used to pick crops. It may be time to invest some serious time and money into research for mechanical or robotic fruit pickers.

I still don’t understand the problem the farmers are having. Is there truly no one in southern California who is willing to pick fruit? Or is no one there willing to pick fruit for a few dollars per hour? I’d have no problem picking fruit all day, but I’d expect at least $12 an hour to do it. Really I think the farmers are just whining about nothing right now. It's probably not the difference of paying someone $50 per day to pick a few a thousand dollars worth of fruit a day or having it rot; the difference is paying someone $50 verses $150 per day to pick the fruit. If that is truly not the case, I’m willing to fly down Thursday nights and fly home Monday mornings to anyone hiring and willing to buy plane tickets. If there really is such a crisis, then paying for me to work for you is still more profitable than letting your crops rot.