Precarious Labor: Asian Immigrant Women, 1970s–2010s

The post-1965 labor migration of Asian American women has taken place in the context of global economic restructuring, a macrostructural process that over the past four decades has integrated national economies into a single global labor market. From advanced capitalist nations like the United States to developing nations such as Thailand and the Philippines, countries trade goods and services, export products to achieve a viable economy, and depend on multinational corporations and foreign direct investments to increase domestic productions. The result includes vast movements of capital, people, and cultural formations across the globe.¹ This chapter situates the labor market incorporation