Question about workers on farms

[Whiskey Wight]

As the title says. Is it necessary or worth having workers on your farms?
Several people have said you can run them entirely with vehicles, so I'm wondering if it's worth the effort to get a workforce on them. Are they necessary at all? or do they just boost productivity? (also, is it possible to run farms with workers and no vehicles? Obviously that's dumb, but I'm wondering if ti's possible.)

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

You cannot run farms without vehicles as those are needed to transport the crops from the fields.

Workers will usually reduce productivity of farms.

[Whiskey Wight]

Originally posted by Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia:

You cannot run farms without vehicles as those are needed to transport the crops from the fields.

Workers will usually reduce productivity of farms.

REDUCE productivity?

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

Yes reduce productivity, compared to just vehicles. They are much worse at harvesting crops.

[Whiskey Wight]

Originally posted by Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia:

Yes reduce productivity, compared to just vehicles. They are much worse at harvesting crops.

Well then, no workers on farms then.
Thanks.

[Dr.Seuss]

Originally posted by Whiskey Wight:

Originally posted by Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia:

You cannot run farms without vehicles as those are needed to transport the crops from the fields.

Workers will usually reduce productivity of farms.

REDUCE productivity?

That's absolutely untrue. If a farm is being worked by a vehicle, having workers work on the farm will speed it up proportional to the number of workers. Farm vehicles all have a "speed" stat, and that speed stat is equal to the number of workers they replace. so, a combine with a speed of 30 harvests as quickly as 30 workers. A large field can accept 250 workers, therefore, if you want, you can add up to 220 workers + combine with 30 speed before hitting the productivity cap (assuming all workers have 100% productivity.)

Furthermore, workers are not!! slower than vehicles. if you bring a large number of workers to a farm plot, you will often see the vehicle speed as much as double. this is especially true for early-game vehicles that have low stats, such as the T28 tractor (the only tractor available in 1960) which replaces only 17 workers. Even a later-game vehicle, the CS-1370 tractor (available for dollars in 1971) has a speed of only 38.

So, clearly workers are indeed a viable option sow and harvest fields. But, they are also more expensive and finicky than vehicles, so is it worth it to use them? That's a more complicated question, but I'd say that, at least on realistic mode in the early game, yes they are. On any other gamemode... well, keep reading.

Vehicles have the clear advantage that they only require fuel, and occasional maintenance. This makes each "workday" produced by a vehicle relatively quite cheap. But, in order to operate a tractor or combine, you must both buy the vehicle-- A substantial cost, considering limited starting cash in realistic mode-- AND build the farm building. The vanilla farm buildings require quite a bit of steel, which makes them $$$ before you've got your steel industry set up. And all for what? Crops are a cheap, bulky resource, as such they demand expensive train or boat infrastructure to export effectively.

But, consider the case of using workers instead of vehicles. You do not, in fact, need to build a "farm" building, only the fields (which are free). Leave space for a farm building for later. Build a free mud bus stop. Build fields within walking distance of the bus stop. The fields must be the ONLY accessible workplace within walking distance (workers will always prefer ANY other workplace before considering working in a field. Finally, build a free distribution office, and add all of the fields as "loading" locations in that distribution office. Set an "unloading" location as well-- probably the customs house, but it could be a food or alcohol or fabric factory. If you have two customs houses near your start location, build the fields near to the customs house you plan not to use for construction.

Congratulations! you have just created a working farm, potentially while still paused on the very first day of your run. All without spending a single ruble. Of course, you will need at least one covered truck, and at least one bus, as, to my knowledge, workers will never walk to a field, even if it is near enough to their house to reach on foot. However, you probably already have a bus bringing workers to your industrial area. this free "farm" is a great way to use up extra workers in your bus before heading back to pick up more. Also, keep in mind to size your fields to be small enough that your workers can actually finish planting and harvesting all in time. I think around 30 workers can handle 1 big field, but it never hurts to be safe.

Later on, workers can still be useful to speed up harvesting, especially when winter is right around the corner, or to get a head start on planting in the spring, so that your fields mature quickly enough to actually be harvested! the question of how "Efficient" a workday in the field is will depending on a bunch of variables, like fertility, travel time, and opportunity cost. It's probably not great, though. If you can afford vehicles, they don't complain or demand pricey booze or meat or electronics. However, it is a very, VERY cheap way to get your workers, well, working. And, it's the only way to speed up a farm vehicle, if you are ever feeling like they are painfully slow.

All in all, I'd say that it's sometimes quite useful to bring workers to a field. They loose out to vehicles if you have unlimited cash to buy a huge number of only the very best vehicles and farms to hold them in, but they can really help a more resource constrained farming operation-- for example, by making the cheaper soviet combines and tractors more viable for large numbers of fields. It's especially useful to use workers in fields if they really don't have anything better to be doing. Factories, universities, constructions-- they all have capital costs going in. Farms, though, can be a very cheap way to soak up workdays, without going deep into debt to build factories.

[Silent_Shadow]

The problem with using workers to harvest is that they reduce the yield of crops from the field by ~40% (sowing with them is fine), and usually there are better things for citizens to be doing than farm work.

[joeball123]

Another issue with allowing citizens to work the fields is that fields are seasonal workplaces, which can create employment and productivity issues.

[Stele]

They do walk to fields. At least did year ago. If you start on prepopulated map it might be worth putting small fields on the outskirts to give people work and get some wheat in cost of trucks (that can be pulled from grain import for harvests) before building industries.

[ling.speed]

Aww beaten by shadow, wanted to be sure, so got into testing... but yeah workers sow at 60% efficiency. So even if 250 workers can do the job so much faster, overal productivity will still be down.

That said, construction is a "seasonal" job as well - could pause it during sowing/harvest.