Migrant workers have received a lot of flack for supposedly taking the jobs of hard working Americans in need of work. So much so, that CNN reports the United Farm Workers Union has launched a new campaign called “Take Our Jobs” challenging Americans to take farm jobs that illegal immigrants fill.
Take Our Jobs website offers to connect applicants with farm jobs in their area. Since June 24, the campaign has received only 4,000 applicants with only dozens of applicants that have followed through the entire process.
According to the Department of Agriculture, nearly one million farm jobs are filled by illegal immigrants. The Migrant Farm Worker Justice Project reports 85 percent of farm jobs are filled by immigrants and in which 75 percent are illegal.
Union president Arturo Rodriguez hopes to bring attention to the AgJobs bill that will give temporary legal status to immigrant workers and longer if they continue their work on the farm.
I remember when my brother, Lou, took a summer job bailing hay in Michigan. I especially remember him recounting the hot days lifting heavy bails and the back pain he suffered at the end of each day. He vowed to never work on a farm again, but I have to admit that the experience taught him to get an advanced education and seek opportunities for growth. Don’t get me wrong, he has always had and continues to have a strong work ethic, but just one summer doing a job that our great grandparents did was certainly enough to be grateful for a future full of opportunity.
Have you ever worked on a farm? If you lost your job and had nothing more to lose, would you work on a farm?
Source: CNN
YEA!! Thanks for the info, I’m gonna check this out. My only other way of getting to work on a farm was through WWOOF, which is great, but you can’t pay back bills 0.o
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