Fresh Air Is Included; Flexible Hours Are Not
BROOKINGS, South Dakota (Farm.FM) — A recruiting firm has rewritten its advertisement for farm jobs after discovering that “flexible hours” meant workers could choose whether to begin before sunrise or finish after midnight, provided they also did both.
The position offered fresh air, independence, unlimited natural scenery, and the opportunity to become part of a family. Applicants were less impressed by the final benefit when the manager explained that family members were also expected to work Thanksgiving.
“It’s a lifestyle opportunity,” said hiring coordinator Trevor Bell, a man whose boots had never been introduced to manure. “Our people enjoy work-life integration.” The owner corrected him: “Our people enjoy a chair occasionally.”
Farm Jobs Discover the Meaning of Flexible Hours
At a recruitment fair, candidates were shown a glossy photograph of golden wheat. The farm’s actual hiring manager brought a photograph of a broken irrigation pump at 2:15 a.m. Human resources asked him to remove it because it did not convey the brand’s sunlit values.
A candidate asked about remote work. Bell answered that the farm offered exceptional remote opportunities, especially the section of pasture twenty miles from the nearest cell signal. Another asked about unlimited vacation. The manager said the cows had recently voted against it, unanimously, without asking the employees.
One young applicant described herself as excellent at multitasking. She had managed six social media accounts. The foreman handed her a flashlight, a gate chain, a feed invoice, and a calf that had escaped into a ditch. “Here’s your seventh account,” he said. “It doesn’t accept password resets.”
The real work is demanding. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics guide to agricultural workers, workers tend crops and livestock, operate equipment, and often labor outdoors in all kinds of weather. Early mornings, weekends, and holidays are part of many schedules because animals and crops do not consult the calendar.
Farm Jobs Come With a Benefits Package Written by the Weather
The advertisement promised “competitive compensation.” The latest BLS figures put the national median annual wage for agricultural workers at $35,890 in May 2025. That is a nationwide median for a broad occupation, not the pay offer at this satirical farm. Bell proposed calling the salary a “cash-light, sunshine-rich arrangement.” The foreman recommended paying wages instead of adjectives.
The recruiter then unveiled an employee wellness plan involving sunrise meditation. The workers explained that they already watched the sunrise while fixing the baler, and the only mantra they repeated could not be printed in a family newspaper.
What Farm Jobs Actually Require
The owner eventually rewrote the listing himself: “Work outside. Learn useful skills. Get paid for honest labor. Know the job can be hard. We won’t pretend a drought is a team-building exercise.” Applications doubled in the office’s unofficial count, which mostly meant two instead of one.
Bell considered this an unacceptable brand simplification. The owner agreed and handed him a shovel so he could gather more market research. By lunch, the recruiter had removed “unlimited fresh air” from the job description. He had received more than enough.
Disclaimer: The recruitment fair, applicants, quotations, and applicant count are satire; the BLS occupational description and wage figure are real. This story is entirely a human collaboration between two sentient beings: the world’s oldest tenured professor and a philosophy major turned dairy farmer.