If farm wages rose 40 percent, each household would spend about $15 more a year, and each seasonal farm worker would be lifted above the federal poverty line.
MCRI ·
Could Farms Survive Without Illegal Labor?
If American growers depend on illegal labor, would strict enforcement of immigration laws drive up prices for fruits and vegetables?
The New York Times
August 18, 2011
Calculating the Costs and Benefits
Updated August 18, 2011, 01:37 PM
Philip Martin, a labor economist at the University of California, Davis, is the author, most recently, of “Importing Poverty? Immigration and the Changing Face of Rural America.”
Americans spend relatively little on food, and relatively little of what they spend represents the cost of farm workers.
In 2009, the total food budget for the average household was $6,400, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’Consumer Expenditure Survey. About 60 percent of food spending was for food eaten at home. Of that, the largest expenditures were for meat and poultry, an average of $841 a year. Spending on fresh fruits ($220) and fresh vegetables ($209) totaled $429; the average household spent more on alcoholic beverages, $435.
Even when packing costs for fresh produce are negligible — strawberries are packed directly into the containers in which they are sold, and iceberg lettuce gets its film wrapper in the field — farmers and farm workers receive only a small share of the grocery store sticker price. In 2006, farmers received an average of 30 percent of the retail price of fresh fruits and 25 percent of the retail price of fresh vegetables, so consumer expenditures on fresh produce meant $118 to the farmer. Farm labor costs are typically less than a third of farm revenue for fresh fruits and vegetables, meaning that farm worker wages and benefits for fresh fruits and vegetables cost the average household $38 a year.