Exploited Labor

Human trafficking: A network of crime hidden across a vast American landscape
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Human trafficking: A network of crime hidden across a vast American landscape

When Bekah Charleston was first targeted as a human trafficking victim, there were no whips, chains or white vans — just a kind face and a fake name who offered her a safe place to stay. As a 17-year-old Texas runaway, Charleston thought she was finding safe haven from drug dealers she had gotten involved…

Was that made by Arizona prison labor? Prisoners make many everyday items
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Was that made by Arizona prison labor? Prisoners make many everyday items

Your child is sleeping on a mattress made from prisoners’ clothes. At state universities, the bedding used in your kids’ dorm rooms comes from T-shirts and other clothing confiscated from prisoners during quarterly “contraband searches.” If a prisoner has too many T-shirts (they’re allowed just a few), or if the “D.O.C.” screenprint wears off, it’s…

An activist artist explores caste discrimination and how to fight it – Los Angeles Times
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An activist artist explores caste discrimination and how to fight it – Los Angeles Times

Good morning, and welcome to the Essential California newsletter. It’s Tuesday, Feb. 14. I’m Suhauna Hussain, a reporter on the L.A. Times business desk. I write about issues affecting workers. I have a heavy topic to cover today: Dalit caste discrimination. Formerly known as untouchables, Dalits fall at the bottom of a centuries-old South Asian…

Stronger Labor Laws Could Combat Human Trafficking
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Stronger Labor Laws Could Combat Human Trafficking

Author Melissa Hope Ditmore suggests that current political attention on human trafficking is performative rather than practical. In her new book, she makes the case for enforcing and expanding labor laws.  There’s an ugly truth about what powers the United States economy, says Melissa Hope Ditmore. Our economic system depends on exploited labor and forced…

Indictment: Restaurant Owners Smuggled Brazilians for Cheap Labor
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Indictment: Restaurant Owners Smuggled Brazilians for Cheap Labor

Editor’s note: the term “illegal” should be “undocumented,” as a person cannot be illegal. Being without documentation is a potential red flag of human trafficking, so in each case, these people may be in need of help. The sordid, sophisticated, and profitable business of illegal migration is exposed in the indictments of several people who…

Spotlight on forced labor fashion as Fashion Weeks underway
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Spotlight on forced labor fashion as Fashion Weeks underway

Fashion Weeks are hitting the runway around the world, but what lies beneath the veneer of glamor? Rampant exploitation of garment workers The fashion industry relies on the exploited labor of workers around the world who make billions of garments every year, the majority of which end up in landfill, for little or no pay…

Why unions can’t ignore incarcerated workers
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Why unions can’t ignore incarcerated workers

An estimated two thirds of the more than one million prisoners in the United States today are incarcerated workers. With many prisoners earning less than a dollar an hour, and those who refuse to work often facing vicious retaliation in the form of punitive solitary confinement, labor exploitation is an important part of what makes…