Title

"News & Issues" piece on a labor shortage that is threatening the Aroostook Coun

Authors

Aimee L. Curl

Source

Maine Times

Date

9-7-2000

Pages

10

Abstract

"News & Issues" piece on a labor shortage that is threatening the Aroostook County potato harvest. Dipping unemployment rates have enabled many people who would normally rely on temporary harvest-time work to find full-time jobs. In addition, even though ten school systems throughout the county recess during the three-week harvest, student labor in the potato fields has decreased more than 10 percent in the past decade. Last year, only 184 out of 1,381 (13 percent) of the kindergarten through twelfth-grade students spent their break working in the fields. Migrant workers have not yet been used in the potato fields. But Andy Yaeger of Smith's Farm in Blaine said that possibility will probably be discussed this year.

Subjects

Labor supply, Potato industry

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