Ask any dairy farmer in the US: it's mostly Latinos whom do the dirty work that in-country people scoff at. If you want something done in the US, it's usually immigrants whom do the hard work.
If people are willing to schlep they have the opportunity to feel purpose and a sense of accomplishment, but if they're going to sit idle and/or get wasted, that's the surest path to rusty irrelevancy. Folks need to bootstrap themselves and find/invent useful contribution to society that can turn a profit, rather than expecting someone to show up and hand it to them.
At what wage? Pretty sure if shoveling cow shit paid an executives salary you would have no problem finding people willing to do it w/o turning to under the table labor.
Yeah, I like Rowe's stuff on the skills gap but I don't think what he is talking about in that article, skilled trades, and what the op is discussing, unskilled farm hand and factory labor, is the same labor market.
If people are willing to schlep they have the opportunity to feel purpose and a sense of accomplishment, but if they're going to sit idle and/or get wasted, that's the surest path to rusty irrelevancy. Folks need to bootstrap themselves and find/invent useful contribution to society that can turn a profit, rather than expecting someone to show up and hand it to them.