In the face of lax enforcement by Biden’s Labor Department, labor organizations have stepped up to protect farmworkers.
Under the new visa pilot program, the administration is prioritizing growers’ profits over farmworkers’ rights.
Washington state fines a mushroom grower $3.4 million for firing women farmworkers and replacing them with male contract labor.
Labor reporters are increasingly focusing on how extreme heat kills workers — and what should be done about it. They could focus on industry opposition to creating federal heat regulations, whether from agricultural employers or warehouse companies.
The bottom-line question is why so many highly profitable companies prefer to spend money to fight the unions instead of offering their vulnerable employees affordable health care coverage and safety from sexual assault.
The wide-ranging executive order focuses on fair and open competition in various sectors of the economy and aims to boost competition and review monopolies across a handful of industries.
“The essential worker term is just lip service; that’s not how we’re being treated by this economy or the people who benefit from food coming from workers in this country."
High-wages and secure jobs for farmworkers can only come by discarding the old deportation/guestworker model, and instead supporting families with legalization, family-based visas, and unions and labor rights.
The choice confronting the Biden administration is whether to expand an immigration program prioritizing grower profits over workers’ and immigrants’ rights, or to reinforce an immigration system based on family reunification and community stability.
Under the current system, “the lungs of the Earth are being plowed up and bulldozed to plant more corn and soybeans so that more animals can be raised in confinement.” "Farmers need to follow the lead of India’s farmers and make our voices heard.”
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