Temporary Mexican workers at Timmies?

[Smurf]

LW I'm pretty sure if you check around you will find that you are talking about the exception and not the majority. I am willing to bet that you will find many more workers paid closer to 10.00 than 20.00 according to anyone I have talked to but that is a small number of either workers or employers as I've had little direct contact with this business.

[theyeti]

good farm hand makes 20 plus for sure its hard work pruning and knowing how to prune fix a fence build irrigation . u cant hire these jobs out for nothing either so a good farm hand is obviously paid 20 + an hr . i only know one person that fits that bill tho . i know alot of orchard owners who just let others run the orchard because it is so much work and such a small cheque if u dont do everything perfect u will go broke .

there r good jobs to be had on the orchards but again its who u know .
my comment about 8.90 an hr or whatever stands true for anyone who moves here from somewhere else and is looking in the classifieds for a job .

sometimes ppl fail to see the little guy in this .

they take one side or the other forgetting that there r lots of ppl in between like me

[LoneWolf_53]

Wolf, I suspect that many pay the min wage of 9.55/hr as required by law as the base wage. It is the production incentive that allows the good workers to earn what your example answered in 20/hr. He probably worked 10 hrs, picked a *bleep* of buckets of grapes @ x$'s/bucket to make that 200 for the day. Money can be made picking but you have to be good and you have to be fast. The farmers are more than happy to pay for these guys because it gets the crop off fast to minimize losses to birds and desication. The 9.55 is only a legal min and you can be sure that if a slack azz isn't picking at least his min wage in grape value per hour, he won't be back in the morning.

Agree absolutely and that is the way it works. All the decent workers that the farmers continue to call back each year, are the ones that are fast, efficient, and consequently earn top dollar.

It's only the slackers, who aren't interested in breaking a sweat, that complain, and figure they should be making twenty bucks an hour too, even though their performance output and competency dictate differently. Crops don't just need to be harvested, they need to be harvested properly, as damage to plants can impact the following years harvest.

These same types who often lack work ethics/discipline and don't show up for work the morning after pay day, which from the farmers perspective does not make for good employer employee relations, and understandably so.

I've always believed that a persons earnings, should be directly related to their productivity, as that's the only metric that's fair to both employer and employee. For top earning orchard/vineyard workers, that's precisely what their pay is based on, and not the legally necessary minimum wage.

I don't think it's pure coincidence, that the biggest whiners, are often also the biggest underachievers.

[Smurf]

I agree but if you read back many are saying this is only a beginners job for students etc. till they comlete their education and improve themselves. It is seasonal so even at $20.00 you do not make a living salary. You have to find something for the rest of the year that also pays decent or go on unemnployment which is very difficult now for seasonal workers. So in reality how many repeat, good, experienced workers are there out there and how many are foreign workers for less pay. There's a good possibility with the changes to unemployment that even the old regulars will be changing to better jobs if possible. It's tough out there and it's getting tougher.

EDIT TO ADD:

I wonder how many of these seasonal workers are working poor that visit the soup kitchens etc. for the portion of the year they are not working.

[keith1612]

I agree but if you read back many are saying this is only a beginners job for students etc. till they comlete their education and improve themselves. It is seasonal so even at $20.00 you do not make a living salary. You have to find something for the rest of the year that also pays decent or go on unemnployment which is very difficult now for seasonal workers. So in reality how many repeat, good, experienced workers are there out there and how many are foreign workers for less pay. There's a good possibility with the changes to unemployment that even the old regulars will be changing to better jobs if possible. It's tough out there and it's getting tougher.

EDIT TO ADD:

I wonder how many of these seasonal workers are working poor that visit the soup kitchens etc. for the portion of the year they are not working.

ohh no worries according to some they are paid very well and can spend the winters im sure lounging in mexico.
im sure thats why the mexicans come up its such a grand career with fantastic daily pay.
BC unemployed are just too lazy to take a good paying fruit picking career

[Fancy]

If BC unemployed aren't interested and are not reliable, no wonder orchardists have to go elsewhere.

[twobits]

I wonder how many of these seasonal workers are working poor that visit the soup kitchens etc. for the portion of the year they are not working.

I wonder how many of them are travelling or collecting EI while spending the off season at the ski hill. That is quite a typical mindset for many of these people that choose seasonal industries for repeated employment. I know a guy, now in his early 60's that fishes for six months a year and travels the world for the other 6. He averages about 50k/yr, yr over yr and wouldn't trade his lifestyle for anything. Some people just like being under employed and they gravitate to the seasonal industries where they can work extremely hard for a short period and make some decent bucks and then go do their own thing with no consequence to their career choice.

[theyeti]

isnt that what the ei system is for .

all those seasonal guys get raped on taxes for the 8 months or whatever that they do work . kinda balances it out giving em a crummy check for the cpl months of downtime .

i dont have a problem with this .

if anyone is the problem its all the government workers. the folks in the ei offices that r there just to deny claims and force ppl to panic .

[keith1612]

I wonder how many of these seasonal workers are working poor that visit the soup kitchens etc. for the portion of the year they are not working.

I wonder how many of them are travelling or collecting EI while spending the off season at the ski hill. That is quite a typical mindset for many of these people that choose seasonal industries for repeated employment. I know a guy, now in his early 60's that fishes for six months a year and travels the world for the other 6. He averages about 50k/yr, yr over yr and wouldn't trade his lifestyle for anything. Some people just like being under employed and they gravitate to the seasonal industries where they can work extremely hard for a short period and make some decent bucks and then go do their own thing with no consequence to their career choice.

i dont think picking fruit gives you enough hours would it?
its generally a short window of work.
when i was a paver working the summer season there was some years it was borderline and i had alot longer timeframe.