Transcript Slide 1
Balancing low-paid work and
remittance sending in London
Kavita Datta and Cathy McIlwaine
Department of Geography
Queen Mary
University of London
Migrants and their Money: Securing a
Better Deal, 28th April, 2007
Research project
• ‘Global Cities at Work’ examines the role and
experiences of migrants working in low-paid sectors
of London’s economy, and links these experiences to
coping strategies
• Funded by Economic and Social Research Council
(2005-2007)
• Yara Evans, Joanna Herbert, Jon May and Jane Wills
• Working papers arising from the project are
available on:
http://www.geog.qmul.ac.uk/globalcities/index.ht
ml
Structure of presentation
• Aims of presentation
• Methodological framework
• Key conceptual debates
• Main empirical findings
• Concluding remarks
Main research aims
• To highlight the costs of remitting on migrant
workers.
• To show that remittances have to be better managed
in order that migrants, and their families, reap the
maximum advantages from them.
• We do this through an empirical investigation into:
nature of remittance sending among low-paid
migrant workers in London
labour market conditions under which these
remittances are produced
personal sacrifices that migrants have to make in
order to remit
Methodological Framework
• Mixed methods approach
• a) Questionnaire survey of 424 migrant
workers
• b) In-depth interviews with 103 migrant
workers
• Working in
Care
Hotel and Hospitality
Cleaning (offices and London Underground)
Construction
Key conceptual debates
• Remittances are the most tangible transnational
flow that link the Global South to the Global North
• Focus of research has been on financial remittances
(“migradollars”) even though it is recognised that
non-economic remittances also play an important
role in the overall well-being of migrants and nonmigrants
• In 2005, remittances amounted to US$167 billion
and were the second largest capital flow behind FDI
and ahead of ODA (likely to be higher still due to
use of IRTS)
Importance of remittances to countries in the
Global South is further illustrated by declining
economic growth rates and ODA
Coupled with the increased volume and visibility of
remittances, this has led some to classify
remittances as the “new development finance” or
new “development mantra”
• Academic research on remittances has explored the
impact of remittances on a range of scales (global,
national, regional and local); and on a variety of
development indices (such as poverty, vulnerability,
inequality)
• On balance, researchers have stressed the positive
aspects of migration and remittances and
celebrated migrants as active agents boosting
growth in both the Global North and South
• More recent transnational approaches, identify
the importance of focusing on both the costs and
benefits of remitting
• We argue that there is a need to locate
remittance sending within the broader context
of migrants lives in host countries.
• There is little appreciation of the conditions
under which remittances are produced, the
cost of remitting on migrants, the sacrifices
that they have to make as well as the
exploitative conditions they have to put up
with.
• It is only by doing this, that we can
acknowledge the costs of remitting on lowpaid migrants themselves while appreciating
the potential benefits of remittances
themselves
Main empirical findings
a) Which migrants send remittances?
• 73% of respondents in questionnaire survey
remitted money home
• Men and women equally likely to remit (74% in
each case)
• In terms of age, those most likely to remit were
aged 45-54 (81%) and 35-44 (79%)
• Migrants from sub-Saharan Africa most likely to
remit (81%), followed by Eastern Europeans
(72%), Latin Americans (69%), Asian/South East
Asians (68%)
• Recent migrants (who arrived between
2001 and 2006) were more likely to remit
(50%) compared to those who arrived
between 1991 and 2000 (40%)
• In terms of sectors, cleaners on LU were most likely
to remit (89%), followed by general cleaners (75%).
Construction workers were least likely (57%)
• Migrants remitted between 20-30% of their income,
but this ranged from 4% in the case of Ajua, a
Ghanaian care worker, to a high of 65% in the case
of Eduardo, a Brazilian construction worker who was
sending money to his two young daughters as well as
his ex-wife
b) Why do migrants send remittances?
• Motives for sending remittances ranged
from altruistic reasons to self-interest
although these are interrelated
• Generally, migrants reported altruistic
reasons for sending remittances. This enabled family
members to meet daily subsistence needs such as
buying food and paying rent, basic utility and
sometimes medical bills
• Remittances also sent to support education of
various family members and used to pay fees, buy
uniforms, books and other materials
• Generally, migrants with close family members were
likely to remit the highest amounts for altruistic
purposes and remit more regularly
• This applied particularly to both transnational
mothers and transnational fathers
Patricia, a care worker from Jamaica, had left her 12 year old
daughter in the care of her father and a domestic helper and
she sent home money once or twice a month. The amount she
sent varied between £50-100.
Jose, a construction worker had three children in Brazil who
lived with his two ex-wives: “I send £660 for two of them. To
the other I provide a ‘basic basket’, so to speak. Every month
my mum goes out shopping, which she then takes to him.
Clothing, shoes and school expenses, I pay for it all. I give £660
to the other two because I want to... I do it because this is my
duty”
• Some reported intra-family conflict in terms of
‘deserving’ and ‘non-deserving’ recipients of
remittances
Barbara a care worker from St Lucia reported: “But
my dad, my sisters, say don’t send a penny to him.
Because when I send to him, he gives it away … To
his other nieces--, his other nieces are much well
off than us, he shouldn’t be doing that at all. My
dad is okay, he’s getting his pension and of course
he has his land so, you know, he looks after the land
and he earns income from the land so there’s no
need for any money to go to him”
• Non-altruistic reasons for
remitting mainly focused
on desire to invest in
businesses, or building
houses in home countries
• Others needed to pay off
debts they had generated
to move to the UK
c) How are remittances generated? Working
conditions among migrants in London
• Low wages
1st period of survey: Oct 2004/Sept 2005
Mean hourly rate = £5.39; NMW = £4.85; LW = £6.70
2nd period of survey: Jan to October 2006
Mean hourly rate = £5.77; NMW = £5.05; LW = £7.05
• Lack of social wage
- One third never had pay rise
- Half lost pay for taking time off for emergencies
- Over half (52%) did not receive sick pay
- Over half (55%) worked unsociable hours (early, late or
night shifts)
• Deskilling
Pedro, a Brazilian office cleaner noted: “many
people think that we immigrants are used to cleaning
in our country but there are many immigrants who
were solicitors, accountants, and in different
professions. We are not just worth nothing, we have
some value.”
• Maltreatment – partly attributable to low value
attached to the work migrants did; irregular status
• Competition between migrants, especially from
Eastern Europe further undermined wage and
employment conditions
Nivaldo, a construction worker from Brazil
noted:
“These are people that work there from 8am5:30pm and then work cleaning for 4 hours at
night. They sleep for 4 hours only each night
and spend only £350 per month. They live in bad
accommodation, they eat badly. They are
dreamers. Once I was talking it with a friend in
a joking way, this are people that for each one
brick they lay here, they think is equal to two
bricks that they are laying in their house in
Brazil. They are people that sacrifice a lot”
d) What are the personal costs of remitting
for migrants?
• Many migrants reported pressure to remit money
back home
Ajua, a care worker from Ghana said: ““a lot of
friends of mine, they have to … , if they get paid
say 200 pounds a week, they have to send about 50
pounds, 100 pounds back home because they’ve got
their mum, they’ve got their dad, they’ve got their
siblings”.
• This must be balanced with the cost of living in
London
• Migrants develop a range of strategies to allow them
to send money home while surviving in an
expensive city like London. This included:
• Sharing accommodation (80% of migrants shared
housing)
• Multi-earning and dual earning (18% had more
than one job; 38% had more than one household
member working)
• Minimising consumption levels (eating less,
searching offers in supermarkets)
• Reverse remittances
Conclusions
• Need to acknowledge the costs of remitting on
migrants so that these stories are not lost in the
euphoria of the ‘new development mantra’
• Given the considerable costs and personal sacrifices
which accompany the generation of remittances, it is
critical that remittances are better managed so that
the maximum benefits accrue to migrants, and their
families
• Focus on remittances should not obscure the fact
that Northern and Southern states, and not migrants,
are ultimately responsible for financing development