Two recent stories offered as antidotes to the “jobs Americans won’t do” baloney:

* My new issue of California Farmer (no, really) has a story on development of a new variety of strawberry that could make mechanical harvesting possible and thus “reduce costs for growers by $5,000 to $10,000 per acre since fresh strawberries are picked almost exclusively by hand.” But will this innovation spread in the context of mass immigration? As Julian Simon wrote, “Even after a discovery is made, there is a good chance that it will not be put into operation until there is need for it due to rising cost. This point is important: Scarcity and technological advance are not two unrelated competitors in a race; rather, each influences the other.”

* A story on the labor challenges of Maine’s boatbuilding industry is refreshing in that nowhere does it mention importing foreign labor. Instead, employers are doing shocking things like “establishing scholarships, beefing up apprenticeships, boosting the industry’s visibility at career fairs, and offering tuition reimbursement to employers who send workers for advanced training.” They’re even targeting “untapped labor sources such as women, minorities, and workers looking to change professions.” Would they bother with any of that if the president had succeeded in procuring for them an unlimited supply of subservient “willing workers”?