WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION 127
pak CaBrE. The profit is in the increase in the value of the land
there?
Mr. WiLey. It has increased a great deal since it came into cultivation.
 I will admit that it has been up and down some; but this
citrus land owes its value principally to the heavy investment in
planting and bringing into production, as well as to the wealthy man
who wishes to have a winter home out there, and likes to have an
orange grove, and has that place principally for a place to live.
Mr. CaBLE. Do you mean to say that the farmers are not making
any money at all down there?
Mr. WiLey. I do not believe the farmers in the past two years
could show a net profit on their investment.
Mr. CaBLE. How do they keep going, then?
Mr. WiLey. By adding a little new money into their coffers, and
gatinaies They can not quit. They can not do anvthing else but
arm.
As I say, if you gentlemen take this supply of labor out from under
us without offering us any substitute for it, it is bound to injure our
economic structure. It will simply stop our operations, it will stop
our development, and then you must remember that you will throw
more skilled labor out of employment than the number of Mexicans
we employ if we can not get them. I have gone through especially
hard years down there. For instance, when cotton fell to the price
where it would not pay to pick it, they left it in the fields. Some of
them unfortunately paid to pick it, and found out that it was not
worth the cost of picking, after they got it, and they were worse off
than the others; and in those times it affected the bricklayer and
the carpenter and the other skilled laborers, and thev were leaving
that district in bunches, hunting work.
Mr. Care. Then that labor you have employed coming from
Mexico each year, is that seasonal labor?
Mr. WiLey. I do not know how much of it comes from Mexico.
Mr. CaBLe. Can you give us an idea?
Mr. Winey. We have a seasonal demand in this particular district
for about 12,000 extra laborers during our cotton-picking season. in
addition to the other.
Mr. Casre. How long does that last?
Mr. WiLey. That lasts from the 1st of August to the 1st of February,
 and sometimes runs into March.
Mr. Care. After March, where do those 12,000 go?
Mr. WiLey. I think they move to other districts that have demands
for labor.
Mr. Caste. In the United States?
Mr. Wirsy. In that southwest country. As a matter of fact,
usually we have a heavy movement of our cotton pickers that go
into the Imperial Valley, I think, in cutting lettuce, during their
heavy lettuce harvesting season.
Mr. CaBLe. The greatest portion of the labor you refer to is in the
United States all the time, then?
Mr. WiLey. I do not know what percentage it would be. In
recent years, when you have had certain restrictions on labor crossing
the border, there are not nearly as many that 20 backward and for-