October 10, 2010
According to the Washington Post, if the answer is not many, then we need to bring in immigrant reporters. That is exactly the logic it used in a discussion of the fact that most native born American citizens are unwilling to do farmwork for this wage.
Economists would ordinarily say that the lack of a labor supply at a given price suggests that the wage is too low. However, the Post only considers this fundamental economic principle in passing. It is likely that if farmworkers received $60,000 a year, with health care benefits, there would be no shortage of U.S. citizens willing to do this work.
Of course this would raise the price of farm products, but it would be much cheaper to advertise in the Washington Post if its reporters worked for $10.25 an hour. The lower cost of advertising would be passed on in lower prices for groceries, cars and other items advertised in the paper. At least this is what people who believe in economics would say.
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