For decades, migrant workers have provided the muscle for harvesting crops across the United States, especially the fruits and vegetables that are picked by hand. They follow the ripening crops from farm to farm for weeks at a time. Since the turn of the century, however, far fewer farmhands are going on the road. A Ball State University study found that 20 percent of farmworkers performed migratory labor in 2009, dramatically lower than the 53 percent of 1998. Workers drop out of migrant farm labor as they marry, become older and settle in their communities, say the researchers.
“Despite a steady total agricultural workforce, substantial decreases in this stream of mobile workers – both documented and undocumented – since the late 1990s have contributed to farmers’ perceptions of labor shortages,” said economics professor Maoyong Fan, the lead author of the study. “Our research is the first to study that shows that a true ‘labor shortage’ may be experienced by farmers despite stable worker totals.”
Farm groups have supported comprehensive immigration reform as a way to assure a stable and legal workforce. Prospects for action in Congress have darkened since June 2013 when the Senate passed a reform bill. Republican leaders in the House refused to call a vote on immigration and the legislation died at the end of 2014. It has not been revived.
“If the current downward trend of migration continues and no alternative supply, such as a revised H2-A program or earned legalization program, becomes available, farmers will probably experience much greater difficulty finding workers during planting and harvesting seasons and may have to substantially raise wages,” says the study. Pay rates for non-supervisory farmworkers rose by 20 percent from 1990-2009.
Rising pay scales and shortages of workers have spurred work on mechanization of agricultural work traditionally done by manual labor. Early this year, for example, USDA announced $3 million in grants to three universities to develop and test robots that work alongside or cooperatively with humans. Half of the money went to UC-Davis for work on mechanized harvesting of orchards.
Tougher border enforcement and changing economic conditions have discouraged illegal entry to the United States, part of the supply of migrant farm labor, says the study. During the same period, farmworkers in the United States put down roots and became less willing to travel. “The average farmworker today is older, more likely to be female, and more likely to be living with a spouse and children in the United States,” said the study.
“We find that U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents were more likely to migrate than unauthorized workers during the 1999-2009 period. Apparently, stricter border enforcement during this period made unauthorized workers less willing to migrate within the United States because they feared such a migration would raise the odds of being caught,” the researchers stated.
Just as the authors said lawmakers should be aware of the adverse effect that immigration law has on the availability and wages of migrant workers, they warned of the natural effect of aging: “Because agricultural work is physically demanding, it is difficult to remain in agriculture over one’s working life … Thus to maintain a large and flexible agricultural worker force, a steady stream of new, young workers is required – whether it be from a porous border, temporary work permits or a perpetual program of earned legalization through farm work.”