What did migrant workers do in the 1930s?
The Great Depression and the Dust Bowl (a period of drought that destroyed millions of acres of farmland) forced white farmers to sell their farms and become migrant workers who traveled from farm to farm to pick fruit and other crops at starvation wages.
What was the life of a migrant worker like?
But the life of a migrant worker is often a harsh and isolated one. Cut off from their loved ones and support networks; often unaware of local laws, languages and customs; and frequently denied the same rights as national workers, migrant workers are particularly vulnerable to abuse and exploitation.
What were some of the struggles that migrant workers faced during the Great Depression?
The Great Depression of the 1930s hit Mexican immigrants especially hard. Along with the job crisis and food shortages that affected all U.S. workers, Mexicans and Mexican Americans had to face an additional threat: deportation.
How many people migrated to California in the 1930s?
The exact number of Dust Bowl refugees remains a matter of controversy, but by some estimates, as many as 400,000 migrants headed west to California during the 1930s, according to Christy Gavin and Garth Milam, writing in California State University, Bakersfield’s Dust Bowl Migration Archives.
Where do most migrant workers come from?
An estimated 14 million foreign workers live in the United States, which draws most of its immigrants from Mexico, including 4 or 5 million undocumented workers. It is estimated that around 5 million foreign workers live in Northwestern Europe, half a million in Japan, and around 5 million in Saudi Arabia.
What did migrant workers?
A migrant worker is a person who either migrates within their home country or outside it to pursue work. Migrant workers usually do not have the intention to stay permanently in the country or region in which they work.
Where did most Dust Bowl migrants end up?
The Dust Bowl exodus was the largest migration in American history. By 1940, 2.5 million people had moved out of the Plains states; of those, 200,000 moved to California.
Do migrant workers still exist today?
Today, migrant farmworkers still suffer mortality and morbidity rates greater than the majority of the American population, due in part to the combination of poverty, limited access to health care, hazardous working conditions, and the lack of regulations.
What was the average salary in 1934?
The average for 1934 was 34.7. The Bureau of Labor Statistics index of employment (1932=100) rose from 107.2 in June, 1933, to 118.5 in December. The index averaged 126.0 in 1934. Payrolls increased more rapidly than employment.