Free range farm workers? | Sojourners

Free range farm workers?

Many of us take great care of where our food comes from, whether it is organic and has been treated humanely. But do we take the same care over the workers who grow and pick that food? Apparently not, according to Salon:

The food industry employs one in five private sector workers. Yet only an estimated 13 percent of those workers make a living wage. Thanks to lobbying by the National Restaurant Association (once led by Herman Cain), the national minimum wage for tipped workers is $2.13 per hour. Many warehouse and farm workers are paid by the piece, which can amount to even less. And so, in a situation riddled with irony, food-system workers rely on food stamps at double the rate of rest of the U.S. workforce.

In the food industry, as in America overall, the concerns of low-wage workers tend to get swept under the table. A generation of hipsters has built its identity around sustainable food. Maybe it’s time to start a new trend. The next time you order that hormone-free hamburger on a stone-ground bun with organic ketchup, ask for a side of worker justice.
 
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