The sour grapes of socialists

September 9, 2025

OPINION by ANDY CALDWELL

John Steinbeck’s classic “The Grapes of Wrath,” published in 1939, got its title from the Battle Hymn of the Republic. The hymn’s line is, “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord: He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.”

The title serves as a metaphor for the wrath of God against those who exploit the oppressed.  The book deals with the subjects of justice and oppression during the Dust Bowl as it affected the migration of “Okies” to the state of California.

The famous photographer-historian Dorothea Lange photographed the famous “Migrant Mother” in Nipomo near a pea-picker’s camp. In that photo, among thousands of others, you can witness the poverty of that era which was by today’s standards unimaginable.

The people were dirt poor. Most were clothed in rags. Their children had no shoes. They were all underfed. And they were all white Americans!

Tough times and poverty have historically been color blind as it affects the plight of migrants looking for a better tomorrow. And that has been true since the beginning of time across all cultures and people groups.

Nonetheless, some labor organizers are demanding that migrant laborers get paid an artificially high wage as if money were no object. Try to imagine the idiocy of two activist groups, CAUSE and MICOP, demanding a $26-an-hour wage for the people who pick grapes in our region, at the exact time that over half of the grapes in Santa Barbara County have been pulled out of the ground because the market for wine grapes has collapsed.

These labor organizers are now treading the grapes of wrath as they exploit the migrant labor class setting them up for failure. But that is only one-half of the story.

These organizations are socialists, and in that, they are economic illiterates like all the socialists who came before them. They have no respect or understanding of profit margins and the principle of return on investment and, of course, they fail to calculate the value of labor as it relates to the cost of doing business.

In a letter to Santa Barbara County Supervisor Joan Hartmann, and in a protest walk amidst the winery outlets in Los Olivos, these geniuses stated: “It is disheartening to realize that while we all get to enjoy the fruits of their labor, the very farmworkers who contribute to such a successful industry are only paid 20 to 30 cents to harvest grapes by hand for each bottle of expensive wine sipped by tourists and ourselves in our scenic and world-renowned wine country. All we ask today is for you to allow farmworkers to enjoy some of the benefits their hard labor generates.”

So, supposedly, the farmworkers get paid the equivalent of 20 to 30 cents per bottle. Does anybody know the cost per bottle earned by the landowner? The vintner? The distributor? The retailer?

Not to mention Uncle Sam and the state of California?

More importantly, if the farmworkers want a bigger share of the profits, are they willing to contribute to rent the land? To pay to plant the grapes? To pay for the cost of water? To pay the property taxes and the payroll taxes? To contribute to the cost of building and operating a winery?

How about the cost to operate a store front in Los Olivos? Are they willing to cover the losses in a down market?

These costs add up to millions of dollars. And the fact that vineyard owners are now either selling their vineyards at a tremendous loss or worse, bulldozing the vines and trying to market the land to grow other crops, proves these ignoramus activists are entirely clueless.

Many of the Dust Bowl Okies fled to California upon losing their land and becoming homeless. When they came here, they were looking for work and, unfortunately, many of them were exploited and discriminated against in many ways, shapes, and forms.

As the saying goes, there is nothing new under the sun. However, you would be hard-pressed to compare their plight to that of today’s immigrants coming to America.

For instance, a farm worker who comes to America from Mexico receives a significant pay increase in that a farmworker in America makes more per hour than a farmworker in Mexico makes for a full day of work. These workers come here because they know they will be able to make more money than they could back home.

They are therefore not coming here to be exploited but to take advantage of the opportunities America has to offer.

Moreover, the disaster they are fleeing is not ecological, it is social, economic, and political. That is to say, the poverty in Mexico which these people are fleeing is endemic to Mexico and all other countries that have socialist influences and tendencies.

Finally, the number one motivation for most all these migrants is to give their children a much better life than they could ever have in their home country.

While the cost of living is high here for everyone, not just immigrant farmworkers, one can’t ignore the fact that many immigrants are collectively managing to send home tens of billions of dollars every year.

In 2024, the amount of money Mexican migrants sent home to their relatives was $64 billion and most of that money came from employment in just two states, California and Texas.  According to the AP,  Mexico receives more money from remittances than any other country except India. Indian migrants send home about $125 billion each year.

In conclusion, the one thing missing from this discussion is the following:

The lefties at CAUSE and MICOP, along with their progressive friends are ignoring the real problem facing poor immigrants, as I am not denying the fact they are poor just like many American-born workers are.

The missing element? The opportunity to become upwardly mobile by moving into manufacturing and industrial jobs which have been destroyed by environmentalists, thereby creating a permanent urban underclass, not just for immigrants, but also for our homegrown children.

Now, that would be worth writing about to County Supervisors Joan Hartmann, Laura Capps, and many other progressives.

Andy Caldwell is the executive director of COLAB in Santa Barbara County and host of The Andy Caldwell Radio Show, weekdays from 3-5 p.m. on  FM 98.5, FM 99.5, AM 1240, AM 1290 and FM 96.9.