Seasonal work at $10-$14/hour is not sufficient to support a person still living in the US during the off-season. The employer is relying on that worker's ability to find work in other seasons, or to decamp to a less costly locale. Even full-time, year-round work at $14/hour is a poverty-level wage by census thresholds for a household size of 5 or more.
A lot of Americans have become pinched by increasing living costs and stagnant wages. They haven't become lazy; they just haven't become more stupid. Working a job has actual costs and opportunity costs. Does the nearest bus route have stops near your farm? Do workers have to cover their own insurance costs? Are they eligible for benefits that would be cut if they have earned income? Could they earn more in another job with better working conditions?
The expectation Americans have is, like people in other countries, that if they work all day on a job that can't be easily done by a robot, they should earn enough to be able to support themselves without further supplementation via welfare programs or charity. When housing costs and healthcare costs go up, that means the opportunity cost of living near enough to a farm to work on it, and assuming the risks of working on a farm, makes the wage minus the implicit costs of working there less than the profit of working for a lower absolute wage at a business in town.
These people calling workers lazy have no idea how much it costs people just to come to work for them. If they did, they would be clamoring for socialized medicine and public housing, instead of fighting it.
A lot of Americans have become pinched by increasing living costs and stagnant wages. They haven't become lazy; they just haven't become more stupid. Working a job has actual costs and opportunity costs. Does the nearest bus route have stops near your farm? Do workers have to cover their own insurance costs? Are they eligible for benefits that would be cut if they have earned income? Could they earn more in another job with better working conditions?
The expectation Americans have is, like people in other countries, that if they work all day on a job that can't be easily done by a robot, they should earn enough to be able to support themselves without further supplementation via welfare programs or charity. When housing costs and healthcare costs go up, that means the opportunity cost of living near enough to a farm to work on it, and assuming the risks of working on a farm, makes the wage minus the implicit costs of working there less than the profit of working for a lower absolute wage at a business in town.
These people calling workers lazy have no idea how much it costs people just to come to work for them. If they did, they would be clamoring for socialized medicine and public housing, instead of fighting it.