Migrant workers have always been an important part of our society. Farm workers have always lived in the shadows of communities, living and working under unsanitary conditions while surviving on small wages with poor access to education, welfare, and health care. These small farmers, except in the South which depended on slaves, relied on family, locally hired hands, or neighbors to meet the seasonal labor demands of agriculture.
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As the crop production grew larger and more specialized, labor was required on a more seasonal basis. By the 1850s, demand for farming production increased to a level that immigrants from several countries were brought in by employment agencies to meet the demand. Along the east coast, African Americans and poor caucasians joined newly arriving European immigrants as part of the seasonal labor force (Migrant Immigrant Labor History). While on the west coast, farmers began hiring large numbers of immigrants from China, Japan, and Mexico. In the South, the seasonal need by former slaves, Native Americans, and poor white Anglos (National Center for Farmworker Health).
The growing demand for seasonal labor was a process that continued through the rest of the 20th century in America. As farming production grew larger and larger, smaller farms that were once the economic backbone for rural communities were absorbed. Small rural communities died out, migration from rural to urban areas increased, and the labor supply needed for these large and specialized farming productions was no longer locally available. |