Word: ferrara
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...cannot in clear conscience continue reading the pro-UFW rebuttals directed at Peter Ferrara's article entitled "Has Chavez Fooled Harvard" without making a stand supporting his article. I was very pleased to see his article and equally perturbed to read all of the attacks against it--with each different reply coming up with their own figures supporting their own beliefs...
...Ferrara complains that the statistics I use refer to the whole country, not just California. He is correct; incomes in California are slightly higher (as is the cost of living). But according to the 1970 U.S. Census, the median family income for experienced California farmworkers (including foremen and skilled machine operators) is only $6200 a year, or 52 per cent of the state median. For Chicano farmworkers, the median is $600 lower. According to the Census data, over 20 per cent of all California farmworker families live below the poverty line. For Chicanos, the figure is 28 per cent. Even...
...quote from the Washington Post, Mr. Ferrara omits a key qualifying sentence. The sentence before the one he quotes states, "The lettuce workers--because of the gruelling stoop labor and specialized techniques involved--is in the economic elite among agricultural laborers." The article goes on to say that a lettuce worker can earn up to $12,000 in a good year. A more typical average income is the $6800 median family income in the Salinas Valley, the center of the lettuce industry. This is higher than most farmworkers' incomes, but it is still only 62 per cent of the state...
...even more serious, Mr. Ferrara neglects to mention that the lettuce workers referred to are under union contract. The Teamsters have been forced by pressure from the UFW to negotiate contracts with higher wage rates. If Mr. Ferrara's point is that the main issue between the UFW and the Teamsters is not wages, he is correct (although wages are one issue, and the UFW contracts do provide higher wages). The main issues are health and safety (according to the national Safety Council, farmworkers' lethal injury rates are 300 per cent higher than the national average); pesticide control; child labor...
...citing the figure of $7785 a year as the earnings of full-time Gallo workers, Mr. Ferrara once again neglects to mention that these workers are under Teamsters contract. He also fails to mention that when that contract was first signed, the Gallo workers walked out because of their support of the UFW, and that this September the scabs who were brought in to replace them walked out on the grounds that the Teamsters were not enforcing the provisions of their contract. The wage figures Mr. Ferrara cites are only meaningful as long as the Teamsters are willing to enforce...