Atlanta Forward readers responded to last week’s pro and con columns about pending immigration reform in Congress. Here is a sampling of comments under the writers’ chosen screen names.
RickinGrayson: Zippy Duvall writes, "A study released by the University of Georgia Center for Agribusiness and Economic Development showed that Georgia growers of seven major fruit and vegetable crops lost an estimated $140 million due to the labor shortage in the spring and summer of 2011." Farmers will always make it appear that their "losses" are higher than the actual losses. Local taxpayers shell out much more in other costs due to illegal aliens than the losses farmers claim, and we are already subsidizing farmers. Farmers are sitting on land that is going up in price all the time. As we increase our population, the demand for land increases, and the cost of land follows. Many U.S. jobs are being outsourced to foreign countries with a lower cost of living. Why should the farmers get any special consideration that the rest of the country is not getting?
Dave: I don't understand either side of this debate. Farm workers are needed. So we are going to make people that make maybe the minimum wage pay a fine to come in and sweat in the fields? "We need you. We want you, but we're going to make you pay." The pathway to citizenship/amnesty folks have got it wrong, too. If there's work to do, bring in workers to do it, but treat them like you'd treat a citizen doing it. If someone wants to become a citizen, get in line and jump the hoops.
JoinBuford: We do not look after our own people! I have several family members who cannot get jobs although they, at one time, had good jobs. If you have not worked in six months, it is almost impossible to be hired. I have one granddaughter who needs an operation. There is no help for her, an American citizen. She cannot get on Medicaid. However, illegals fill the emergency waiting rooms at the hospitals waiting to get free care. There is something wrong with this picture! There has to be a way to bring in people to work the farms without the rest of the population having to pay taxes to school millions of their children and furnish health care and all the other freebies they get. When you add all that up, my head of lettuce is really costing me about $25 a head. I cannot afford it!!
