The Chicano Worker is an incisive analysis of the labor-market experiences of Mexican American workers in the late twentieth century. The authors—each established in the fields of labor economics and research on Chicano workers—describe the major employment patterns of the Chicano labor force and discuss the historical and institutional factors determining these patterns. This work speaks to the continuing widespread public interest in Mexican immigration, migrant farm labor, unionization of farm workers, Chicano education and training needs, and the legacy of discriminatory treatment against Chicanos. The authors treat the convergence of these issues and their public policy implications.
Drawing from census data as well as other sources, The Chicano Worker reports on Chicano unemployment, labor-force participation, occupational and industrial distributions of employment, and various indices of earnings. It also deals with such issues as history, family size, health, and culture. The Chicano Worker is likely to open new areas of interest, discussion, and criticism concerning Chicanos in the United States.
This is the best analysis of the work experience of the Spanish-speaking of the Southwest currently available. It disposes of any number of misleading impressions and undercuts popular myths and the conventional wisdom at some point on nearly every page. It is also an invaluable source book.
The study is as valuable for the questions that its authors raise as for the answers they offer.
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1. The People
- 2. Labor Supply
- 3. Income and Earnings
- 4. The Job Market
- 5. The Rural Economy
- 6. Public Policy Needs for Future Economic Opportunity
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
