In The News

Domestics Dump Sponsors while on Holiday in London

Sanaa Maadad July 23, 2004
During the hot summer months, wealthy residents of the United Arab Emirates often go on holiday to cooler destinations, such as England. Recently, however, some have found that the foreign domestic workers they take with them when they travel 'run away' in hopes of pursuing a life in Europe. Many of these maids and servants are Sri Lankans, Filipinos, Indonesians, Ethiopians, or...

EU Faces Rise in Welfare Migration

Hans-Werner Sinn July 12, 2004
Traditionally Western Europe has faced both “good” and “bad” immigration, the former being the result of international income differentials and a healthy economy, and the latter being the result of immigrants seeking to take advantage of the welfare state. Hans-Werner Sinn, an economist at Munich University, contends that the adoption of the EU’s new directive on freedom of movement will result...

Immigration is Changing the Face of Suburban America

William G. Holt, III July 6, 2004
New immigrants to the US are settling in some surprising places. In the past, most newcomers to the US found comfort and kin in the urban centers of cities like New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. But increasingly, says sociologist William Holt, immigrants are settling in the suburbs of 'second-city' destinations like Atlanta and reversing a trend set by the earlier period of...

Exploding the Myths of Offshoring

Martin N. Baily July 1, 2004
In the heated public discourse in the US on outsourcing the aspect that is most often highlighted is the threat of American job loss to low-wage workers in India. In this essay a former Clinton administration economist Martin Baily and Diana Farrell , director of the McKinsey Global Institute make the case that outsourcing is in fact win-win for both the countries. They say that with the digital...

Can Corporations Safeguard Labor and Human Rights?

Susan Ariel Aaronson June 24, 2004
Recent scandals over US mistreatment of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan have badly tarnished America’s human rights record. Grave as the abuses are, says globalization scholar Susan Ariel Aaronson, the Bush administration can help restore at least a measure of goodwill by promoting human rights and labor protections in the factories of US-based multinational corporations. The anti-...

Immigrants Don't Steal the Jobs of Germans

Patrick Welter June 11, 2004
With 4 million Germans currently unemployed, immigrants have become an easy scapegoat to blame for job losses. And it is the potential immigrant who wants to settle down in Germany that faces the biggest roadblocks to immigration, notes this article in FAZ Weekly. Under a proposed immigration law, bureaucrats will be allowed to screen potential immigrants to see whether they will prove beneficial...

Filipino Workers, Activists Protest Over Jobs

Cody Yiu June 3, 2004
For years Taiwanese industry and construction companies have relied upon the labor of Filipinos, Thais, and migrant workers from other Southeast Asian countries. Labor relations have not always been smooth, however, with reports of abuse and exploitation surfacing from time to time. The latest labor conflict, reported here in the Taipei Times, concerns 19 Filipino workers who were being over-...