The Tradeoff of Temporariness: Economic and Social Impacts of H-2A Status on Mexican Migrant Men

As the H-2A visa program expands to become a core component of contemporary Mexican migration to the United States, questions emerge about the tradeoffs migrants face between temporary and undocumented statuses. This article employs propensity score matching of participants in the Mexican Migration Project—an extensive binational survey of Mexican migrants and their families—to compare economic and social outcomes of H-2A visa recipients vis-à-vis undocumented migrants. Findings indicate that although H-2A visas offer benefits like a lower cost of living while abroad, they do not produce a discernible effect on wages relative to wages earned by undocumented migrants. While H-2A migrants are more likely to work in the formal economy, they are also less likely to build social capital or language proficiency in the United States than undocumented migrants, indicating a degree of social isolation that can be exploited by employers. This comparison contributes to a growing literature on the proliferation of temporary migratory statuses and the marginality experienced by migrants within these statuses.

COVID-19 impacts on the guava crop production system in Calvillo, Aguascalientes, Mexico

<p>The COVID-19 pandemic, caused by SARS-CoV-2, caused productive disruptions in the guava production system of the municipality of Calvillo, Aguascalientes. These disruptions included delays in the application of phytosanitary management measures against weevils and fruit flies, pests of quarantine, and economic importance, due to the appearance of positive cases among operational and technical personnel. Manual harvesting, an activity that requires large crews of agricultural workers, was delayed due to labor shortages. The cost and supply of fertilizers and pesticides were also affected due to problems in the supply chains of agro-inputs. The sale price of guava in supply centers and local markets fell on average from 10.83 to 10 MN/kg during the months of highest demand due to a 60% reduction in agricultural activities. In Calvillo, the return of Mexican migrants from the US and the presence of asymptomatic cases influenced the spread of SARS-CoV-2 among the local rural community.</p>

The Weight of Migration: Reconsidering Health Selection and Return Migration among Mexicans

While migration plays a key role in shaping the health of Mexican migrants in the US and those in Mexico, contemporary Mexican migration trends may challenge the health selection and return migration hypotheses, two prevailing assumptions of how migration shapes health. Using data from the Mexican Family Life Survey (2002; 2005), we tested these two hypotheses by comparing the cardiometabolic health profiles of (1) Mexico–US future migrants and nonmigrants and (2) Mexico–US return migrants and nonmigrants. First, we found limited evidence for health selection: the cardiometabolic health of Mexico–US future migrants was not measurably better than the health of their compatriots who did not migrate, although migrants differed demographically from nonmigrants. However, return migrants had higher levels of adiposity compared to those who stayed in Mexico throughout their lives; time spent in the US was also associated with obesity and elevated waist circumference. Differences in physical activity and smoking behavior did not mediate these associations. Our findings suggest positive health selection might not drive the favorable health profiles among recent cohorts of Mexican immigrants in the US. However, the adverse health of return migrants with respect to that of nonmigrants underscores the importance of considering the lived experience of Mexican migrants in the US as an important determinant of their health.

Imaginaries of Migration

How do Mexican migrants in Germany perceive themselves and their lives? Innovatively combining theories of interculturality and social imaginaries, Yolanda López García uses the anthropological method of life stories to investigate the understudied area of Mexican migration to Germany. She discusses areas such as quality of life as a motivation for migration, the role of banal nationalism in imaginaries, the dynamic subjective re-construction of Mexicanness, and the process of (imagined) »Germanisation«. Yolanda López García ultimately argues that individuals, as social agents, engage with and construct new emerging imaginaries, which may be viewed as important engines of social change.

Understanding of Mexican Migration to the United States: Rifts and Challenges

It has been decades since legislative issues have thought about social, defense, and compassionate issues of migration which has become a touchstone in U.S strategy discussion. Mexican migration to the U.S started in 1848. It has proceeded to the present with no critical interference, something that makes this work movement very particular as a basic segment of the American work advertise. Generally started with enormous development, driven by starvation, political problems, open doors in the U.S; that point eased back, tightened, or unexpectedly finished, from 1850 to 1882, similar to the case of the Chinese. The details show that Mexico is a key source of settlers in U.S and has long been a major source of enemy contact with refugees, but so many have been focusing on Mexico and not the other countries which have also become major sources of illegal immigrants. The United States and Mexico are bordered with California, San Diego, and Baja California, Tijuana, and the Pacific Ocean. The boundary stretches eastward to El Paso, Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua, Texas, on the Rio Grande. From that point the border continues south-east along the Rio Grande River until the end of it in the Gulf of Mexico. Border stretching of over 1945 miles is insufficiently regulated. Only old solid markers, rusty safety clasp and spoiled dry fence posts can be found in many parts of the place, and the river Grande that over the centuries has continuously changed its course separating both nations. U.S endeavors to control passages and exit adequately have been focused principally along the most profoundly dealt transit courses driving to north. U.S. powerlessness to control all the Mexican boundary has proven that any Mexican involved in operating in the U.S seldom discovers that the frontier is an unlikely trap Through the span of the most recent 170 years, Mexican migrants have to a great extent worked in horticulture, farming, mining, and railroad development.