Domestic Immigrant Workers

Do you know that there are from 2.5 to 90 million domestic workers World Wide, according to the International Labour Office? A domestic job is basically a job that is performed in one or different households, which provides different services, such as house cleaning. Other domestic job branches are the people who take care of elders and children, while performing some household cleaning. Most immigrant domestic worker are currently being discriminated by employers.

Many domestic workers tend to be immigrant women in the lower class, with little or no education. According to Johnson (2015), women who are engaged in domestic work attained an education level below standards, such as late elementary or early middle school graduates. Most of the women were forced to this profession due to their difficult economic circumstances.

The people that perform these types of jobs are daily discriminated either by their boss or people who they provide the service to. Many employers take advantage and discriminate against people because they know they need the job to survive. Due to these women’s dependency on such jobs it makes it easier for their employers to lay them off for no reason and with no compensation if their work is found unsatisfactory. Domestic workers have laws that protect them, but people are often scared to take action due to their immigration status. They unfortunately accept discrimination in order to remain in the dark.

Domestic workers get paid below the state minimum wage and receive few or no benefits like health insurance or sick days. According to the Fair Labor Standards Act, workers are guaranteed a minimum wage, over time, sick days and vacations. However, this does not apply to the domestic workers community. When people generally think about immigrant domestic workers they speculate that they don’t pay taxes. For this reason they are not included within the Fair Labor Standards Act.

While in many cases these workers don’t pay taxes it is also important to keep in mind that most are not getting any form of labor benefits that would normally be available, such as Social Security, vacation time, sick days and most importantly maternity leave. Maternity leave is important because the body goes through pain that is comparable to getting 20 bones fracture at the same time. Every single woman in this line of work is forced to confront a difficult situation when they become pregnant because as soon as their employer finds out they can get laid off to avoid maternity support costs.

The domestic service company my mother works for benefits from the exclusion of non-taxpayer workers from Fair Labor practices because, according to them, the company has no obligation to cover such benefits and thus saves money. Such practices result in worker poverty and suffering. According to Johnson (2015), the economic theorist Karl Marx asked why people suffered from poverty in the world when there was an abundance of wealth. The answer to his question, and the reason domestic companies benefit from a lack of regulation, is that capitalism often favors company owners and alienates workers because it is only concerned with profit.

Because the government doesn’t enforce any type of legislation for the benefit of immigrant workers, companies like my mother’s are able to withhold benefits from their employees. This practice is unfair because people in this career are being exploited. In order to replace the feeling of alienation in the domestic workforce the government has to take action and enforce laws that benefit domestic workers by offering equality.

The first step to finding a solution is for workers to confront their employers about their discriminating practices. Allowing discriminatory practices to go unchecked is the main reason why discrimination continues. If discrimination continues, these workers need to contact the Federal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is responsible to keep work environment safe and equal. To prove discrimination the person needs to keep a diary of all the injustice suffer, is very important to record the date, time, location, witness and a very detail picture of the incident. Other objects such as pictures or videos of the incident are very helpful to convince authorities.

Lets work together to end discrimination because according to Ingersoll “We rise by lifting others.”