Random thoughts on ag labor shortage

[RichZ]

The perception that farmers are wealthy is killing this country. I'm a farmer, and **** proud of it. My wife and I own a goat dairy, we also sell free range eggs and raise fiber sheep. I also have an off farm job to make ends meet. And we barely make ends meet, even though to the untrained eye we are a very successful farm. With the rising gas prices, feed and hay prices rise, They have to. I used to do my own haying, but I don't have the time for it anymore. As Robert can tell you, haying is a hugely labor intensive job. I couldn't hay and tend my livestock, so I have to buy my hay and feed,

I pay my farm help $10/hour. I have one kid who's been to prison on drug charges, and is trying to turn his life around. He can't get a job anyplace else, and when he managed to get work it was at minimum wage. He's thrilled to be making $10/hour and learning a trade. I pay him, and the other kids who work for me, before my wife and I figure out if we have the money to go to the grocery store. If we can't, we eat a lot of our own free range eggs and lots of pasta.

If not for small family farms like us, Americans would only get their food from corporate farms or foreign countries. Do you think foreign food products are as safe as ours????? I highly doubt it. As a goat dairy, I am inspected by the state monthly, they take milk samples and we have to maintain our product by very strict parameters. I'm not complaining, I totally agree with these regulations. They keep our food safe. I know for a fact that other countries do not have our standards. Maintaining these standards is EXPENSIVE. I could run my farm for half the cost if I didn't have to maintain these standards, but I wouldn't want to even if I could. I believe that American farmers have a responsibilty to maintain the safest and most wholesome food supply in the world.

Most of us farmers are in this business because it's something we believe in and love. If you figure out what we, the owners of the farms make per hour, you would probably be shocked. We don't come close to minimum wage. I get up at 4 AM, feed my livestock, milk my goats, and get ready to be at my day job at 8AM. My farmhelper comes in at 6:30AM and works until 4PM. My wife works the farm fulltime.

We are not wealthy, I suspect most of the members of TBN could buy and sell us. But we believe in what we do. I spend many nights staring at the ceiling wondering how I'm going to pay my feed bill. My wife and I often have to figure out which bill we can afford to wait on and which we have to pay now. Yet, to most people, we run a very succesful farm.

We have three tractors, a 1951 Ferguson TO-20, a 1967 Oliver 1550, and last year, we went further in debt to buy a Kubota 4630, because I needed at least one tractor that I could operate in a snowstorm without having to run a salamander under it to heat up the frozen hydraulics. We also have 2 pick-ups and a cargo van( 2001 Silverado, 1999 F250, 2000 GMC cargo van).

Does our equipment make us seem wealthy??? Maybe so, if you didn't know any better, but I need it to operate my farm. I need two fwd pickups to run my farm, and I use the cargo van as my livestock trailer, as our livestock is small.

I'm not complaining, I wouldn't have any other life, but stating that farmers are wealthy, just ticks me off. Try to appreciate the people who grow your food!!! We're not making the big bucks that many others do. And we don't care, we believe in what we're doing. But, please, just have a little respct for the people who work hard to give you some safe and wholsome food for your family.

OK, I'm off my soapbox. Sorry for the rant.

 

[bigshovel]

Right on, Rich

 

[MossRoad]

So the question is, if someone can barely make a living by farming AND holding down an off the farm job... Why do it? It sounds like farming is a losing business. It sounds self abusive at that point.

And no comments about "He just doesn't get it". Sure I get it. We all have hopes and dreams. We just have to weigh out from time to time if those dreams are achievable without putting us in an early grave or taking time away from family.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

So the question is, if someone can barely make a living by farming AND holding down an off the farm job... Why do it? It sounds like farming is a losing business. It sounds self abusive at that point.

And no comments about "He just doesn't get it". Sure I get it. We all have hopes and dreams. We just have to weigh out from time to time if those dreams are achievable without putting us in an early grave or taking time away from family.

Most of the time a farm can make money but not to the extent some people think. I love working outside and am fortunate to be in construction and farming so that I can spend most of my time outside. As long as I can make a decent life for my daughter and myself I will continue working the way I do. I also keep looking to expand into other ares to bring in more money and help add to the bank account for the future.

What you will find is most farmers would rather scape by doing something they love then make decent money doing something they dislike. I know I would never want to be stuck working inside a building all day for the rest of my working life.

 

[dooleysm]

I never thought so many people would bristle at being described as 'wealthy'. I've been called alot worse, and I imagine that many people would consider me wealthy.

I reiterate that I don't think farmers are wealthy. I stand by my position that everyone on this board, myself included, are less in need of charity of any kind than a whole class of people (whatever you want to call them) that includes folks that are illiterate, homeless, sick, or in other ways disadvantaged. That was the whole point I was trying (and apparently failing) to make in my initial post on this subject.

 

[Farmwithjunk]

Farm labor issues may be front page news nowdays, but they sure aren't anything new. It's been difficult to find strong, young, healthy hard working help who's willing to work for peanuts and a free lunch since the beginning of time. The work ethic has fell to it's knees in this country, making it more difficult to find CAPABLE help as compared to 25 or 30 years ago, yes. But long and short, it never was easy to get good CHEAP help. That's why old time farmers had 15 kids.

I farmed for more than 35 years before finally recognizing the fact that my land was worth more in terms of dollars to someone else than it was to me personally. I made more with a 5 second stroke of a pen than I could have farming for the next 50 years. It's a noble profession, very rewarding, an absolutely wonderful environment to raise kids, and a HUGE risk. Like ANY small business, there are success stories, "status quo" stories, and absolute failures. More often than not, it's about how much effort YOU personally are willing to put forth and NOT how much labor you can wring out of your help for minimum wage. All along the way, I made certain I NEVER backed myself up against the wall by constantly relying on cheap labor. If I found it, I took advantage, but never would I get involved in anything where I didn't have the resourses to get the job done by myself or with help I knew I could rely on (ie Wife, son, daughters, dad, ect)

All along, I maintained an off farm full time job that far exceeded my farm income. In short, I "survived" farming at night and made a decent living by day.

I grew corn, soybeans and wheat. Sold about 2/3rds of the crop and fed the rest to 10 to 25 head of beef cows at any point. I raised hay and sold about half. I kept pace with mortgage payments, managed to steadily improve my equipment over the years, and finally, after 35 years, had assets that were worth 20 times my total investment. I never did consider myself "wealthy", however, by the time I called it quits, my net worth was beyond my wildest dreams. It can be done. If I can pull it off, it's not at all impossibe.

Not sure I have anything to offer to those guys who need big numbers of helpers who'll work for chicken feed other than there's better ways to go about making a living. We owe our families and our selves the priviledge of living a good life. If we get so wrapped up in living a dream we loose track of the end goal, don't expect miracles.

 

[chh]

So the question is, if someone can barely make a living by farming AND holding down an off the farm job... Why do it? It sounds like farming is a losing business. It sounds self abusive at that point.

And no comments about "He just doesn't get it". Sure I get it. We all have hopes and dreams. We just have to weigh out from time to time if those dreams are achievable without putting us in an early grave or taking time away from family.

Its hard for me to say why. I was raised on a ranch, raised my kids on a ranch/hog farm. All my kids know how to work, have jobs and/or are in college and support themselves. I worked as a meatcutter for years, have an Ag degree and could make more money most of the time flipping burgers at Mickey D's than from ranch work, but its what I choose to do. If you don't do it or haven't done it is really hard to "get it".
Yes, you really can raise bristles calling any farmer or rancher "rich". The only way they can ever be truly rich monetarily is if they sell out. To many of the people I know that would make them "poorer" than they have ever been in their life. My father would get fighting mad at the very idea of splitting up "his" ranch for a houseing addition. Almost as mad as at some "enviromentalist" or "animal rights" person telling him he was raping the land or abusing his livestock. He took this old place from being "cottoned" to death in the 30's to a working ranch operation by sweat, tears, and the income from being a school teacher. Somebody driving a beemer telling him how to be "ecofriendly" didn't get very far with him.

 

[dooleysm]

I agree completely with what Farmwithjunk said. Farming is one of many respectable ways to earn a living. I would love to do it if I could, but the startup costs are way too high, like many small business endeavors that I'd like to try. At this point in my life my family is the most important thing to me, and the financial security my current job affords me trumps any small business aspirations I may have.

 

[RichZ]

The question of why do farmers farm is a tough one. And if you have to ask, you probably won't understand the answer. I wasn't raised on a farm, but was around farming and farms my whole life. When my wife and I finally bought our farm, we felt that we had acheived our dream. To many people it might be a nightmare, but not to us.

Farming is something that you have to love, as you're not likely to make a lot of money at it. I have lots of friends who are farmers, and we all are happy if we can pay our bills from day to day. Farming is a way of life, and something in your blood, it's difficult to understand. I would certainly be more financially secure if I had never bought my farm, but I would never have been as happy. I acutally have dreams about losing the farm, and those dreams are nightmares from which I wake up in a cold sweat. I think that only other farmers can understand that.

But, if there weren't family farms, as I said earlier, this country would be dependent on food from corporate farms and foreign countries, and the standards to which those foods are produced are very poor. My wife and I prefer eating food that we have either grown, or food that we know the origin of. I think that is becoming more and more common now in the USA, as I think it should.

I've know dozens and dozens of farmers in my life. I've never known a wealthy one. But all that I've known were very happy with the life that they chose. I'd rather be happy than wealthy.

 

[Jimmyp5]

The H2B caps are causing problems in the landscaping industry as well..

The H2B working visa is a nonimmigrant visa which allows foreign nationals to enter into the U.S. temporarily and engage in nonagricultural employment which is seasonal, intermittent, a peak load need, or a one-time occurrence.


The H2B visa caps have nothing to do with AG labor...There is currently an annual cap of 66,000 visas for H-2B workers. There is currently no annual cap on visas for H-2A workers. (AG Workers) This said, local landscapers can apply for H2B visa for employees, I see the problem in granting them as meeting the rules for H2B and the little understood system of visa's by the general populace.