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...USDA figures published in 1972 indicate that there are 2.8 million farmworkers (defined as anyone who did farm labor for money any period of time) who averaged 88 days of work per year and $1160 in annual wages. It can hardly be argued that aggregation distorts this figure, since the USDA breaks the general category down into subcategories, and no subcategory of workers averaged earnings anywhere near the figures quoted by Mr. Ferrara. (See Table.) The USDA's finding that no subcategory of farmworkers averaged even a minimally decent average wage is confirmed by three separate studies (by the USDA...
...Ferrara is correct that USDA figures may not include all wages from piece rates, but, given the realities of agricultural production, it is inconceivable that piece rates would substantially increase the income of a significant number of farmworkers. First, there are only a few instances where piece rates are paid as an increment to a base hourly wage, and piece rates alone generally produce low earnings. (Testimony before the 1969 Senate Sub-committee on Migratory Labor indicated that only 10-25 per cent of all farmworkers worked on a piece rate basis and that, at a maximum, a worker might...
Again, his use of data is very misleading. Mr. Ferrara mentions only farm corporations, but USDA figures indicate that in 1968 40 per cent of all farm tax returns over $500,000 were filed by sole proprietorships. In addition, USDA definitions of "farm corporation" include only those corporations where farm products account for the largest part of business receipts. Therefore Tenneco, which owns approximately 1,000,000 of California's 36.6 million acres of agricultural land, would not be included in Mr. Ferrara's statistics. It is estimated that the 1 per cent of farm corporations that Mr. Ferrara refers...
...base rate pay, leaving out the piece rates, for your hourly wage statistics as you have done in this letter. Even these are incorrect. The UFW has also quoted your health statistics for years, but no one has been able to find where you got them and the USDA isn't claiming them. On the farm income figures in the letter from Mr. Carlip this $10.90 figure includes only base rates. You can really only get an accurate picture of farmworkers' wages with piece rates if you inspect the payroll records on file at the IRS and the Federal Wage...
...more than an inch or so of variation in the height of their identical-looking rumps. Uniformity is only partly the result of breeding. More important than genetics are the skillful methods used to turn every calf into a 1,100-lb., slightly blocky steer that will yield USDA Choice Grade Beef. The object is to remove as many variables from the beef-raising process as possible and replace them with more stable techniques copied from the assembly line. "If we do things a little bit better than the others," says Farr, "when we lose money, we'll lose...