* * * * *
                                        
              A job in a place that's even flatter than Florida …
                                        
> But his biggest problem is that he can't find help. He says farmers in his
> area have been trying and trying and trying. They just can't find anyone to
> move to a small town where it is four hours to the nearest decent airport.
> He thinks he could hire two, maybe four people full time.
> 
> Must be the wages? “Can't be that,” he says, “I will nearly pay whatever it
> takes … with overtime, they could make almost $80,000 a year.” On top of
> that, he will pay all the health care coverage and let people live in one
> of the houses he owns in his local small town, “just because I thought it
> would help me attract a family.” Beef is free too, and he doesn't need to
> go to Costco to buy it for the lucky family, either.
> 

“Help Wanted: Over $50K/yr+Free Health Care+FREE HOME and No Takers [1]”

Incredible.

The only down sides?

18–20 hour days at crunch time (planting, fertilizing, and havesting) and
it's in the middle of Kansas (hmmm … he doesn't mention tornado insurance).
But the fact that Craig the Farmer is barely managing a 3,000 acre farm by
himself means that the work must pretty much be fairly automated, and
probably needs someone just in case, like pilots on modern aircraft [2]. In
fact, Craig says:

> Skill? “I can teach them easily,” he says. “My equipment is goof proof, it
> has to be.” By that, he means that an employee need not even know how to
> drive straight, the tractor is guided by a sophisticated guidance sytem
> hooked into three satellites.
> 

“Help Wanted: Over $50K/yr+Free Health Care+FREE HOME and No Takers [3]”

Sounds like even the tractor could be automated. Heck, if there's high speed
Internet connectivity, I might think about it—especially if I could
computerize the tractor.

Then again, there is that tornado thang … 

(And some comments [4] about the job … )

Update Wednesday, June 11^th, 2008

Spring [5] found follow-up post about the job [6].

Figures there would be a tornado involved …


[1] http://blogs.jobdig.com/wwds/2008/05/25/help-wanted-over-50kfree-health
[2] gopher://gopher.conman.org/0Phlog:2007/12/28.2
[3] http://blogs.jobdig.com/wwds/2008/05/25/help-wanted-over-50kfree-health
[4] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=200228
[5] http://www.springdew.com/
[6] http://blogs.jobdig.com/wwds/2008/06/11/follow-up-on-

Email Sean Conner at sean@conman.org

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