Cases in Business & SocietyDown on the Tomato FarmShould migrant workers have labor rights?

By Julian Friedland, Ph.D.

Yellow Sub, a leading U.S. fast food chain, was receiving mounting pressure from the Coalition of Okeechobee Workers (COW), a Florida-based tomato pickers' labor rights group. The company purchased an average of 10 billion tons of tomatoes from Florida per year and relied on independent farms where illegal migrant workers, mostly from Latin America, were paid as little as 40 cents per 32-pound bucket of tomatoes picked. That wage amounts to less than $8,000 a year-well below the U.S. poverty line of $9,500 for one person.

In response, COW started a boycott against Yellow Sub that quickly spread through high schools, colleges, and churches. The company complained that the hourly wages of tomato pickers adjusted for inflation had fallen by 50 percent to 60 percent since 1980. Furthermore, workers often lived in dilapidated shacks, sheds, garages and motels where a dozen or so might share a single room. Their status as black market labor, COW argued, made them fearful of being deported, suspicious of union organizers and vulnerable to exploitation.

Perhaps what galvanized the boycott most, were slavery cases reported by undercover activists in which workers were beaten and held against their will by labor contractors. Several of these cases had gone to trial and more were under investigation in north and central Florida.

The activists succeeded in exposing a labor-contracting ring that smuggled hundreds of workers for a fee to a tomato farm in Okeechobee, where they were forced to work without pay and threatened with torture if they tried to escape. Unfortunately, since agriculture is the state's second-largest industry after tourism, the Florida legislature had done precious little to help migrants. So COW decided to target a leading industry client, Yellow Sub with a boycott and protests at shareholder meetings.

The company initially tried to ignore the protests and to deny responsibility for the behavior of its suppliers. "We don't believe it's our place to intervene in independent suppliers' labor practices," said Joe Walsh, the Yellow Sub media representative, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. Asked about the possible link between farmhand slavery and Yellow Sub's food, Mr. Walsh replied, "It's horrific, but has nothing to do with us." Adding, "Besides, there's no

other area from which to get the produce we need to sell our subs at an affordable price."

But the company's attitude began to shift as the boycott gained support from celebrities and a few popular retired legislators. It seemed increasingly unwise for the nation's leading purveyor of submarine sandwiches to be publicly linked to the exploitation of poor farm workers.

Many thought that COW's demands were entirely reasonable. It was asking for a pay raise of only one cent per pound of tomatoes picked-the first major wage increase in Okeechobee since 1980, and almost doubling the current standard wage.

COW asked that the funds be given to suppliers directly so that they may be passed onto the workers. Regular random monitoring would thus have to be made in order to ensure that the pay had been increased. It also asked that Yellow Sub reward farms that treated workers well. The total cost to the company would be only about $100,000 a year, a sum COW claimed Yellow Sub could easily bear with annual sales totaling about $8 billion worldwide. But since Okeechobee only produced about 10 percent of Yellow Sub's supply, if the company eventually

raised wages across the board, it would cost $1 million.

Although the company could well afford even $1 million, it was still reticent to make the change for it feared the precedent it would establish. First of all, these workers were illegal and thus arguably should not even have the right to work in the United States. Wasn't it the government's decision to either deport the workers or make them legal residents? Once they were legal, they could negotiate with the government for a minimum wage. Although Yellow Sub could afford to meet COW's present demands, what was to stop the coalition from making unreasonable demands in the future? This initial victory could embolden workers to seek further and more costly concessions down the line.

Some executives thought this could lead to a dangerous slippery slope and should be blocked right away. These critics suggested making a public announcement that the company would lobby the government to give existing farm workers green cards enabling them to negotiate higher wages or to obtain better work elsewhere. But it was not clear that this would satisfy COW and stop the boycott, which was surely beginning to impact sales. And would the government agree to such a policy?

Even if it did, it was not certain the illegals would show up. President George W. Bush had already granted illegals a short period in which to obtain green cards but so many were fearful of the offer being a deportation trap that only very few applied. Another option was to divest out of Florida and seek produce from abroad. That might motivate the legislature to step

in and deal with the problem itself. Unfortunately, this solution would cost more at least in the short term.

Read the Case Study and answer the following questions:

1. If the workers were Yellow Sub employees instead of individuals hired by independent farms (suppliers), what would Yellow Sub be required to do to ensure the workers were legally authorized to work in the US? 2. Should Yellow Sub, and employers in similar situations, be held in any way responsible for ensuring the workers of their suppliers are legal (not children, not enslaved, paid appropriately, etc)? Why/why not? 3. Should illegal workers be afforded the same rights as legally authorized ones? Why/why not? 4. Should employers be allowed to hire illegal workers in industries such as this one where it is common and unlikely to be able to find US workers to do the job for the pay? 5. Is it realistic to expect legal U.S. residents and citizens to take such jobs? Could the market/companies afford to pay such workers the legal minimum wage or whatever it would take for them to accept the work and to do it well? Why or why not?