Thread: Defending Labor Rights for Illegal Alien Women

Providing help in labor rights for women

Tucson Citizen

The four women, all but one of whom were illegal immigrants, were happy to get the job.

It was 14 days straight of cleaning apartments at $7 an hour for an independent contractor. At the end of two weeks, each of the women was expecting a healthy paycheck. Instead, the man they were working for disappeared and disconnected his phone.

That's just one of the stories of workplace exploitation collected by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) over the past year as it launched an effort to help immigrant and low-wage woman workers.
Now, AFSC is collaborating with the University of Arizona's Southwest Institute for Research on Women (SIROW) to create the Women Workers' Project.

Every Wednesday, starting Sept. 5, the groups will jointly hold a labor rights clinic to provide free legal consultations and labor rights education.
Sebastian Quinac, AFSC's immigration/border program coordinator, said the groups are focusing on women because female workers are consistently overlooked in workplace rights issues.

This oversight is significant in the face of the increasing numbers of women coming to the United States from Mexico and Central America in search of better wages.

Whether they arrive legally or not, they don't usually complain about workplace exploitation, which most often takes the form of unpaid wages, for obvious reasons.

"They're afraid they will get in trouble if they complain about unpaid wages or other abuses," Quinac said.

Illegal immigrant women are also more likely than men to work in the underground labor market, taking jobs as child-care providers or house cleaners with individual employers.

These informal employment arrangements leave women especially susceptible to the denial of basic wage, hour and safety protections.
Nina Rabin, an attorney with SIROW, said illegal immigrant workers share nearly all the same rights as American workers.

"Part of the problem is that most undocumented workers don't think they have those rights. They just assume, 'I'm here illegally. I don't have any legal rights,' which is really not true . . . Employment law has always covered all workers, regardless of their legal status."

This new project will help the women do whatever it takes to get the wages they've earned or to resolve other workplace abuses.

They can file wage claims with the industrial commission or file suit in small claims court, Rabin said. If the worker is afraid of drawing retaliation by filing an official claim, her problem might be resolved by sending the exploitative employer a letter from a lawyer or by bringing public attention to his or her practices.

"It basically amounts to slavery if you are having someone work for you and not paying them," Rabin said.

I know some readers don't care about the rights of illegal workers (the project's resources are available to low-wage, documented immigrants and American women, by the way). You break the law, you take your chances, they say.

But they should care - and not just because hiring a person and not paying for the work is unethical, immoral and illegal.

Programs such as this one matter because failing to provide recourse for the exploited only exacerbates the problem of illegal immigration.
If you think about it, this program works in tandem with the employer-sanctions law recently passed in Arizona.

Both aim to reign in employers who have until now scoffed at employment and labor laws.

And as fewer companies hire illegal labor in response to the state law, many of their workers will be driven to the underground labor market.
If Americans in that black market believe they can get away scot-free with abusive practices, then that creates an unbelievable incentive for them to keep right on hiring illegal immigrants.

Of course, in the bigger picture, both the new state law and the labor rights clinics are nothing more than Band-Aids for the damage caused by our national refusal to come to terms with how critically our economy relies on immigrant labor.

Until we resolve the issue of how much labor we need to import and how to achieve that in a orderly and legal manner, the abuses and chaos on all levels will continue.

Anne T. Denogean can be reached at 573-4582 and adenogean@tucsoncitizen.com. Address letters to P.O. Box 26767, Tucson, AZ 85726-6767. Her column runs Tuesdays and Fridays.

http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/daily/local/61017.php

"Part of the problem is that most undocumented workers don't think they have those rights. They just assume, 'I'm here illegally. I don't have any legal rights,' which is really not true . . . Employment law has always covered all workers, regardless of their legal status."

Yes, employment law generally covers all workers...all LEGAL workers. Those same employment laws mandate an employee provide the employer with proof of identification, such as a legal social security number. It also requires the employer to report employee wages, taxes, etc. as well as pay employment taxes, unemployment taxes, and workers' compensation.

If you have sneaked into this country, are being paid under the table, or being paid using a stolen SS# or some other fraudulent document.....too bad. That's the chance you take when you lead an illegal life.

If you want protection, come to this country legally and work legally. We already have labor laws on the books. There is no need for a specific law to protect illegal alien women who shouldn't be working here period.

I'm sorry, but I don't feel one damned bit sorry to hear these stories. I get ripped off every day of the week being forced by circumstances to stay in a job where I'm paid only $1,000.00/ per month for a job where I should be earning at least $3,000.00/ month but am not because wages have been driven into the toilet by illegals.

I'm also subject to verbal/emotional abuse at any time when things are not going my boss' way, he doesn't feel that he's making enough money to add to his $100 million net worth, or the family is arguing and they decide to take it out on whatever employee falls into their crosshairs.

Where's anybody advocating for me? There isn't anyone. So, you'll have to excuse me if I don't have one ounce of sympathy for criminals who, as far as I'm concerned, decide to roll the dice and lose every now and again. They get what they're asking for being here illegally.