As jobs dry up, immigrants return home

Leah Rae
The Journal News

MOUNT VERNON -- Wanda Dos Santos wrestled a series of giant suitcases down a narrow flight of stairs, with hands manicured in red, white and blue.

Her daughter and three grandchildren, visiting from Brazil, took turns sitting on an overstuffed case to try to zip it shut. Then they piled into two cars bound for John F. Kennedy International Airport, accompanying Dos Santos back to Sao Paulo after her 12-year stay.

Dos Santos left the United States this month with only limited English, but she explained her situation in one clear phrase: "No more cleaning lady."

Housecleaning jobs in the New York suburbs once brought her $1,000 a week, but her income fell to $300 in recent months, she said. Customers started scaling back in January 2008 or stopped hiring altogether.

Stories abound of immigrants departing for home as the jobs dry up. And experts are searching for a pattern: Is the economic downturn causing a reverse migration?

Intriguing as the idea may be, there's no hard evidence, concludes a report released earlier this month by the Migration Policy Institute.

Researchers do see evidence that the growth in the undocumented population has come to a sudden halt. But they have no data showing that people are returning to their home countries in any great numbers.

There are reasons illegal immigrants may stay put in the United States despite a recession, said researchers from the institute, a think tank based in Washington. They might not want to risk paying more to get back into the United States down the road. In the case of Mexico and Central America, rising crime has been a deterrent.

But above all, the decisions depend on economic conditions back home and how the local currency stacks up against the U.S. dollar. Those circumstances have more to do with immigration than the circumstances in the United States, according to MPI's research.

"If it's hard here, it's worse over there," said Frances Glick, who sells airline tickets and money transfers from an office in Suffern to a mostly Mexican clientele. She's heard many customers say that they're leaving for good, but she's seen some of those same people return after a few months.

Those who stay in the United States, with no access to safety-net programs, may take desperate measures to find work, the MPI study warned.

Dos Santos, 62, didn't leave before trying a last-ditch strategy she had previously used as a newbie. She paid $4,000 to another Brazilian woman, who "sold" her the opportunity to clean four additional houses. The buying and selling of jobs is not unheard of in the Brazilian community, even if homeowners are oblivious. This time, though, the jobs never materialized, Dos Santos said. The woman left town with the money.

In Brazil, the economic news has been mixed. The nation's economy is on the rise, but its currency dropped 33 percent against the dollar in the past year, MPI noted.

Jobs are still hard to find in Brazil, despite the improving economy, said Marisa Francischini, 50, who immigrated 19 years ago and became friends with Dos Santos in Mount Vernon. She said she received her green card through the lottery process, allowing her to travel between the U.S. and Brazil.

"I always make my money. I have no problem," Francischini said. Her current business is selling outfits and accessories to nightclub dancers - a profession apparently unharmed by the recession.

But she said it made sense for her friend, Dos Santos, to return to Brazil.

"I feel happy for her. She's here by herself. She needs to see her grandsons growing, you know, because she's going to miss everything," she said.

Historically, economic conditions do not seem to match up neatly with immigration patterns. There was a dip in immigration during the Great Depression, but that might be explained by the quotas imposed during the 1920s. There is no historical parallel to the global financial crisis happening today, the MPI study said.

But immigrants are working in sectors that are most vulnerable to the current downturn, including construction, hospitality and personal services, and illegal immigrants are clearly being affected. Research by the Pew Hispanic Center identified just two periods during this decade when illegal immigration did not increase, and both came during recessions: one in 2001-02 and another in 2007-08.

Dos Santos said she came to the United States after her husband died and was able to send money back to family members in Brazil. She came as a tourist, overstayed the visa and never tried to seek legal status, she said. Without family members in the United States or a steady employer, she had no one to sponsor her.

Her plan now is to retire, with income from her late husband's pension.

"When I came, I came happy, with the dream that I always dreamed," she said in Portuguese. "Everything I could do, I did."

recession|unable to find work in U.S., BRAZILIAN goes home