Challenging Employer Control within the H-2A and H-2B Visa Programs

• DOI: 10.1177/0002716219856854
• Date: 01 July 2019
• Published date: 01 July 2019

ANNALS, AAPSS, 684, July 2019 241

DOI: 10.1177/0002716219856854

Challenging

Employer

Control within

the H-2A and

H-2B Visa

Programs

By

BRYAN MOOREFIELD

856854ANN THE ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMYChallenging Employer Control within H-2A and H-2B Visa Programs

research-article2019

Migrants holding H-2A and H-2B visas—contracted

labor migrants—predominate in the new migration

system that has emerged between Mexico and the

United States. These migrants have been growing

numerically in an era when net Mexico-U.S. migration

has fallen to zero and undocumented migration is nega-

tive. These migrants are committed to contracts that

require them to work for one employer, at a specified

job, in a particular place, for a set duration of time, or

risk loss of legal status and deportation. When visas

were scarce, as they have been historically, this effec-

tively gave employers monopoly over their contracted

workers. This article describes the current system,

particularly with respect to the U.S. labor market and

the geography of both Mexico and the United States.

With more employers now seeking H-2A and H-2B

workers, the current moment may provide migrant

workers with greater leverage to challenge the domi-

nance of labor contractors and employers by moving

among firms, industries, markets, and states from one

contract to the next.

Keywords: labor migration; temporary workers; non-

immigrant visas; United States; Mexico

The H-2A and H-2B visas effectively consti-

tute the U.S. “guestworker” program for

“low-skilled” labor. These visas allow interna-

tional migrants to enter the United States to

work a temporary job for a pre-determined

employer under a pre-determined contract.

H-2A visas authorize migrants to work in agri-

culture, while H-2B visas authorize work in

seasonal jobs in other industries. When migrants

complete these jobs, the U.S. government

Correspondence: bryan_moorefield@brown.edu

Bryan Moorefield is a PhD candidate in the Department

of Anthropology at Brown University and a predoctoral

trainee at Brown’s Population Studies and Training

Center. His dissertation examines Mexican citrus work-

ers in the H-2A temporary worker program in the state

of Florida based on extensive fieldwork done throughout

Mexico and the southern United States.