The Bicker Board

[Durian Fiend]

"He said that he worried for his workers, even though they had legal status."

If they are legal they will be fine unless they have criminal convictions.

I can't get past the paywall but that article is dated about the same time as the others.

Most likely they would be OK but there have been exceptions, and since no immigration lawyers are on the Big Island it's understandably considered a risky proposition by some people.   So, one ramification of this new reckless and indiscriminate policy is that many workers are not expected to return.

There are a few comments on that article from Kona side residents that support what the growers quoted in the article said, including the $30/hr.  

Here's one more passage from the story: 

"..During a lunch break, Salvador Cancino, 47, who has devoted his working life to coffee, said that he and others in his extended Mexican family were long-timers on the island. They have green cards and American citizen children, and own their homes.

But he said that younger undocumented immigrants had been arriving in recent years to replace aging pickers. Many of the newcomers are Hondurans who grew coffee in their homeland, which for years has been plagued by one of the world’s highest murder rates.
Several of those workers unloaded 100-pound bags of coffee at a mill on a recent Sunday.  “There is a lot of work here, and you can make good money,” said Darwin, 26, who arrived in the country four years ago and who spoke on the condition that he be identified only by his first name because of his immigration status.  He said he made $400 a day working the harvest, and had his wife join him in Hawaii..."

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

workers unloaded 100-pound bags of coffee at a mill on a recent Sunday. “There is a lot of work here, and you can make good money…
He said he made $400 a day working the harvest,

Question:
Do you think Mexicans & Hondurans in Kona are taking jobs from young unemployed Ka’u residents? Who could drive to work every day? Will they do this work?

If the coffee farmers go out of business because of a policy that deports their coffee pickers, does this create businesses in America, or bankrupt them? Increase employment or decrease?

Make coffee more affordable or less affordable?

[leilanidude]

We already have legal ways to immigrate..

And, just think, now we have armed white national thugs terrorizing our neighborhoods too.

It's a twofer.. ain't America grand?

Appears to be plenty of non-white officers in the pictures of I.C.E. agents.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

We can’t know every detail about every issue, but if you don’t understand the difference between entertainers and real news reporters who know their subject matter, it’s easy to be led astray with unreliable information. 

Here’s an example.  On Big Island we’re all fairly familiar with Kona coffee, and what it takes to produce the crop, the labor, the amount that can be produced on the limited land that’s available.  So if you watched this Fox News segment (write up below) you understand they don’t know what they’re talking about.  But if you’re unfamiliar with Kona coffee production you might buy into this nonsense. Most of the Hawaii coffee discussion is near the end of the article:

During a later segment on Fox News midday panel show Outnumbered, host Emily Compagno suggested that concerns over a disruption in coffee supply or increased costs were short-sighted because “we actually make our own coffee” in the United States, referencing the farms in Hawaii. Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner agreed with her colleague that “we can clearly make our own,”

Regardless of the Fox hosts’ assertions on Monday, all of America’s coffee farming takes place in Hawaii, which accounts for less than 12 million pounds of coffee beans harvested and utilized. In other words, the nation consumes 282 times as much coffee as it produces on an annual basis.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world...87067.html

[MyManao]

Thanks for asking..

Hey, Obie, I didn't want to let this go by without saying good on you man. Congrats, if that kine thing is in order.

[Obie]

Thank you very much .

[leilanidude]

Regardless of the Fox hosts’ assertions on Monday, all of America’s coffee farming takes place in Hawaii, which accounts for less than 12 million pounds of coffee beans harvested and utilized. In other words, the nation consumes 282 times as much coffee as it produces on an annual basis.
-----------
San Diego area has coffee farms....

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

San Diego area has coffee farms....

Sure, just enough coffee from Hawaii and San Diego for TV hosts to rattle on for a few minutes on about how we don’t need imported coffee. Entertaining?  Maybe for people who can’t find the remote. Informative?  About trade policy?  Not so much because whenever I watch that channel I find numbers and counting and addition aren’t required when they’re driving a false narrative.

[Durian Fiend]

workers unloaded 100-pound bags of coffee at a mill on a recent Sunday.  “There is a lot of work here, and you can make good money…
He said he made $400 a day working the harvest,

Question:
Do you think Mexicans & Hondurans in Kona are taking jobs from young unemployed Ka’u residents?  Who could drive to work every day? Will they do this work?

If the coffee farmers go out of business because of a policy that deports their coffee pickers, does this create businesses in America, or bankrupt them?  Increase employment or decrease? 

Make coffee more affordable or less affordable?

  Would you care to answer your own questions?   

While reading another NYT story/interview today, this one about plummeting birth rates everywhere in the world except for sub Saharan Africa, it occurred to me that deporting young immigrants is an especially bad idea unless they are in fact criminals.   Filling factory jobs and coffee fields with young white Americans seems highly unrealistic.

[kalakoa]

Filling factory jobs and coffee fields with young white Americans seems highly unrealistic.

Except that's the goal -- there's no other way to bring manufacturing back to the US.