Pei-Chia Lan’s chapter “Legal Servitude and Free Illegality: Migrant “Guest” Workers in Taiwan” sheds light on the economic roles and political loopholes revolving overseas contract workers (OCW). Lan claims, “The ‘guest worker’ policy in Asia has created a highly exploitative system of labor migration. Migrant workers not only lack political rights and civil liberties but also are deprived of the economic right of market mobility” (Lan, Kindle Locations 3646-3648). We learned in my World History class in high school that undomument immigrants contribute to 11% of social security funds despite not having access to them. This statistic likely changed five years later (it is probably higher now). Even though immigrants are putting in as much work as their American citizens counterparts, they do not receive the same benefits since they are alien. As Professor Maira taught us in our Asian American Communities class, the American government wants OCW for their labor, but not their lives. On a personal note, my grandfather left Vietnam for five years to make a living in America while my grandmother and their five children stayed in My Tho. He worked for five years making just $2 and hour cutting grass at Disney World. For five years, he was separated from his family just so he could make enough money to sponsor them (including my mother) to come to America. I always wonder, if he were given more benefits and had been paid more, they would not have been separated for so long.
Bibliography
Lan, Pei-Chia. “Legal Servitude and Free Illegality: Migrant “Guest” Workers in Taiwan.” Asian Diasporas.
Image of Disney World Sign
No comments:
Post a Comment