Labor Migration in Asia

Author(s): Philip L. Martin

Source: International Migration Review, Vol. 25, No. 1 (Spring, 1991), pp. 176-193
Published by: The Center for Migration Studies of New York, Inc.
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CONFERENCE REPORT
Labor
Migration
in Asia
Philip
L. Martin1
University of California,
Davis
International
migration
for
employment
is
usually
studied
by examining
countries that
export
labor to or that receive
foreign
workers in Western
Europe,
North
America,
and in the Middle East. Other labor
migrations
are
usually
considered
special
cases
(migration
into South
Africa),
a continua?
tion of historical
patterns (migration
across African
borders),
or
relatively
small labor
migrations (migration
into
Singapore). Among
the three
major
economic
regions
that dominate world economic
output
and trade?the
U.S.-led North American
region,
the German-led
European region,
and the
Japanese-led
Asian
region?international migration
for
employment
within Asia has been
conspicuous by
its absence from literature.2
A recent conference
sponsored by
the United Nations Center for Re?
gional Development (UNCRD)
in
Nagoya, Japan
examined the
growing
importance
of labor
migration
for four
major
Asian labor
importers (Japan,
Hong Kong, Malaysia,
and
Singapore)
and five
major
labor
exporters
(Bangladesh,
Korea, Pakistan,
Philippines,
and
Thailand).3
Although
reli?
able data are
unavailable,
the four
major importing
countries include over
one million
foreign
workers and
persisting
differences in
wages, unemploy?
ment,
and economic
growth
rates,
as well as events in the Middle East which
have reduced the demand for
foreign
workers
there,
are
expected
to make
international labor
migration
within Asia an
increasingly important phe?
nomenon.4
1
Professor of
Agricultural
Economics at the
University
of
California,
Davis.
2
There have been articles on labor
migration
into
Singapore,
and the effects of
emigration
on labor
exporters
such as the
Philippines,
but Asian labor
migration
is covered most
extensively
in the
clipping
service
provided by
Abella since 1986.
3
Taiwan is also
debating
whether to
import foreign
workers,
but was not
represented
at the
conference. Neither were Australia and New
Zealand,
which are not considered Asian countries.
China has almost 100
companies
that
export
workers,
usually
as
project-tied
workers to build a
steel mill in
Africa;
for
example,
it too was not
represented
at the conference.
Half of these
foreign
workers are
illegal
aliens in
Malaysia. Japan
has
81,000
legal foreign
workers, 65,000
foreign
students and
trainees,
and an estimated
100,000
to
200,000
illegal
aliens.
176 IMR Volume
xxv,
No. 1
CONFERENCE REPORT 177
The conference concluded that international labor
migration
would
increase within Asia because the
tight
labor markets and
rising wages
which
have stimulated
Japanese
investment in other Asian
nations,
for
example,
have not been sufficient to eliminate
migration push
and
pull
forces
(Abella,
1990).
Japan
has
aggressively
invested
throughout
Asia,
taking capital
and
jobs
to workers instead of
improving
workers,
but
Japan
has not eliminated
labor
shortages
within the
country.5 Hong Kong
was not as successful as
Japan
at
restricting
labor
immigration,
so its
manufacturing
industries have
been slower to restructure.
Singapore very effectively
controls
foreign
workers,
but has not
yet
decided
exactly
how
quickly
to force
lower-wage
industries to
go
abroad.
Finally, booming Malaysia
has
very
little control
over
immigration
and a
segmented
labor market which
complicates
the
job
restructuring process.
Labor
shortages
are
occurring
in
Singapore, Hong
Kong, Japan, Malaysia,
and Korea as
foreign
worker
employment
in the
Middle East is
shrinking,
so the
Philippines,
Thailand,
Bangladesh,
and
Pakistan are
looking
with renewed interest to send workers to Asian labor
markets such as
Japan.
There is an
important background
factor in all
discussions of future labor
migration
within Asia: China has 1.2 billion
people
and several
corporations
which send Chinese workers abroad. If
labor-short countries decide to recruit unskilled Asian
workers,
and Chinese
workers are made
available,
China is
expected
to be able to
supply
all of the
foreign
workers
required by
Asian labor
importers.
LABOR IMPORTERS
Japan
Japan
is Asia's economic locomotive.
During
the
early
1970s,
labor short?
ages
in
manufacturing prompted
a debate over the need for
guestworkers,
but cultural
insularity prevented employers
from
winning approval
for
foreign
workers before the 1973 oil
price
hikes
brought
about a recession
and industrial
restructuring
to make
foreign
workers
unnecessary.
In the
Hong Kong
has about
75,000
legal foreign
workers and
perhaps
20,000
illegal
aliens.
Malaysia
has
400,000
to
800,000
mostly illegal
alien workers.
Singapore
has
150,000
legal foreign
workers.
There are about 15 million
foreigners
in Western
European
countries and about 15 million
foreigners
in North America.
Between 1986 and 1989
Japan
invested
$11
billion in three
fast-growing
Asian economies
with a combined
population
of 250
million?Malaysia,
Thailand,
and Indonesia.
Korea, Taiwan,
Hong Kong,
and
Singapore (the
4
Tigers)
invested another
$11
billion in these
countries,
versus
a U.S. investment of
$3
billion. A recent article
predicted
the 600 million
people
in Western
Pacific?Japan,
the 4
Tigers,
ASEAN,
and coastal Chinese
provinces Guangdong
and
Fujian?
would
surpass
the EC and North America in economic
activity
within a
generation (Tanzer,
1990).
178 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
early
1980s,
Japan
was considered the best
example
of an industrial
country
that
enjoyed rapid
economic
growth
without
foreign
workers
(Reubens,
1982).6
However,
since the
mid-1980s,
there have once
again
been com?
plaints
from
employers
of labor
shortages;
for
example,
in
May
1990,
the
Japan
Food Service Association
urged
the
government
to admit
up
to
600,000
unskilled workers on two to
three-year
contracts.
Illegal
immi?
grants
have
begun
to arrive while the
government
debates how to
respond
to labor
shortage complaints.
There were
2,000
illegal
aliens
apprehended
in
1983, 14,000
in
1988,
and
23,000
in
1989,
and in 1990 there are an
estimated
100,000
to
200,000
illegal
alien workers in
Japan.7
The men?
from the
Philippines, Bangladesh,
Pakistan,
and China?find unskilled
jobs
in construction and small factories while the women?from
Thailand,
Taiwan,
and the
Philippines?work
as entertainers in bars and restaurants
and as maids.
Japan
has an alien worker admissions
system
which
requires employers
to
request
the
Immigration
Bureau of the
Ministry
of
Justice
to
certify
that
a
particular
alien worker is needed. The
employer supplies supporting
documentation,
and the
Immigration
Bureau makes a decision on the
employer's application
without
any
formal consultation with the
Ministry
of Labor. If the
Immigration
Bureau
approves
the
employer's request,
it
issues a certificate which
permits
the alien worker to secure the
appropriate
visa from a
Japanese
consulate before
departing
for
Japan.
Most
temporary
employment
visas are for three
years
or less.
This admissions
system applies
to all
foreign
workers,
but
requests
to
import
unskilled alien workers are
routinely
denied.8 Instead of
approving
the admission of unskilled alien
workers,
labor-short
Japanese employers
have been advised
by
the
government
to recruit older and
disadvantaged
Reubens
(1982:750)
reviewed two
explanations
for
Japan's "exceptional" nondependence
on unskilled
foreign
workers:
tight
controls to
keep
them out
despite push
and
pull
factors,
and
factors within
Japan
which
1)
nunimize the amount of low-level
work;
and
2) integrate
low-level
jobs
into the labor market so that domestic workers would take them.
The
Ministry
of
Justice
estimated that
100,000
aliens were in
Japan longer
than
they
should have been in mid-1989. Shimada
(1990:3)
estimates
that,
with the addition of
persons
legally
in
Japan
as
students,
for
example,
but who violate the terms of their
stay by working,
there are "several hundred thousand"
illegal
alien workers.
8
There are limited
exceptions.
The
foreign
children or
spouses
of
Japanese
citizens can
enter
Japan fairly easily
to work
there,
and there are an estimated
40,000
to
50,000
South
Americans of
Japanese
descent
employed
in the
Japanese
auto
parts
and
apparel
industries.
Another limited
exception
are
foreign?usually Filipino?brides imported by Japanese
farmers
to be both wives and farmworkers. Several hundred have been
imported,
but success has been
mixed,
in
part
because husband and wife often have no common
language.
CONFERENCE REPORT 179
workers or to restructure
jobs
so that unskilled
foreign
workers are not
needed.
Japanese employers
who cannot find unskilled
Japanese
workers have
been
turning
to
illegal foreign
workers instead of
restructuring. Filipino
women have been
imported legally
as
singers
and entertainers for a
decade,
and the networks established
by
this
immigration
have been
expanded
to
import illegal
alien men for construction and
manufacturing jobs, especially
to small and medium-sized
manufacturing
firms such as foundries.9 In
1987,
about 70
percent
of the
11,300
illegal
aliens who were
apprehended
while
working
in
Japan
were from the
Philippines.
Most
illegal
alien workers
arrive on
90-day
tourist visas and then
go
to work as unskilled and semi?
skilled workers in small
manufacturing plants.
Most earn about 60
percent
of what
Japanese
workers in
comparable jobs
earn,
although
one
study
reported
that the
illegal
aliens earned more than
comparable Japanese
workers
($7.30
versus
$5.40
hourly)
because
they
had no
job security (Koga,
1990).
This case
study
of subcontractors with less than 30
employees
who
made
parts
for auto manufacturer
Fuji
found that
4,000
to
5,000
illegal
Bangladeshi
workers were
up
to half of these small firms' work
forces,
and
their
illegal presence
was known and tolerated
because,
without
them,
these
small firms could not survive
(Koga,
1990).
After the
June
1990
employer
sanctions
law,
these
employers
switched to Brazilian workers of
Japanese
ancestry,
who are
permitted
to live and work in
Japan
without restriction.
Most
illegal
aliens arrive in
Japan
as tourists and then
work,
but there
are also
65,000
foreign
students and trainees in
Japan.
In some
cases,
labor
recruiters
sign up
Chinese or Korean 20 to 30
year-olds
for
Japanese
language training
and then
put
the students to work as soon as
they
arrive
in
Japan.
These students want to work in
Japan,
and
usually
see the tuition
payment
as the
price
of
getting
into
Japan
to work.
Immigration
to
Japan
is
regulated by
the
Immigration
Control and
Refugee Recognition
Act
(ICRRA)
of
1952.10ICRRA,
which went into effect
on
June
1, 1990,
included sanctions of 2 million
yen
(about $15,000)
for
every illegal
alien hired
by
an
employer. Despite
the labor
shortage
debate,
9
Most of the
81,407
legal foreign
workers
granted
visas to work in
Japan
in 1988 were
entertainers
(71,000).
The next
largest groups
were business executives
(6,100)
and
language
teachers
(2,000).
There were
only
30,000
legal foreign
workers in
1980,
including
20,000
entertainers.
10
Japan requires refugees
to have
documentary proof
of
political persecution
and a
Japanese guarantor. Immigration
statistics show that
Japan accepted
an
average
30
refugees
yearly
since 1982. Kono
(1990)
reports
that
130,000
refugees
arrived in
Japan
between 1975
and
1989,
and that
63,000
have been resetded in third
countries; 35,000
are
awaiting
resetde-
ment in
refugee camps;
and
25,000
are setded in
Japan.
180 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
the
June
1990 amendments do not deal with unskilled
guestworker migra?
tion "because the issues needed to be discussed further"
(Suwa, 1990:6).
However,
the
June
1990 amendments are
expected
to make it easier for
professional
and skilled workers to work in
Japan
because
they
force the
Immigration
Bureau of the
Ministry
of
Justice
to
publish
its heretofore
unpublished entry requirements
and to act
quickly
on
employer requests
to
admit and
employ foreigners?administratively,
the Bureau now has less
discretionary authority
to
deny entry
to
lawyers
and accountants who wish
to work in
Japan.
Ten additional
occupations
are
permitted
to
employ
foreign
workers,
including lawyers
and
accountants,
doctors and
nurses,
and
research and
education,
bringing
the total to 28.
While
making
it easier for
professionals
to work in
Japan,
the
June
1990
amendments
toughened
sanctions
against employers
and brokers of
illegal
aliens. Most unskilled
illegal
aliens are recruited
by
labor
brokers,
enter
Japan
as tourists and
they
are then taken to a
Japanese employer
who has
arranged
with the labor broker for their
employment.11
The new 2 million
yen
fine and
prison
terms of
up
to three
years apply
to
foreign
and
Japanese
labor brokers and
Japanese employers
who
knowingly
hire
illegal
aliens.
Illegal
aliens
working
in
Japan
remain
subject
to fines of
up
to
300,000
yen
(about $2,500)
and
up
to
three-year prison
terms.
The
June
1990 amendments caused confusion and concern
among
work?
ers and
employers
in the
construction,
shipping,
and restaurant industries.
Several
newspapers reported falsely
that all
illegal
alien workers would be
imprisoned, although only illegal
aliens
entering
after
June
1,
1990 were
threatened with
imprisonment,
and an estimated
20,000
left
Japan
after
March 1990
(Suwa, 1990:7).
The
resulting
labor
shortage complaints
from
small and medium-sized businesses
prompted
a
flurry
of
government
activ?
ities. A
May
1990
government survey
of
10,000
employers reported
that 15
percent
hired
foreign
workers within the
past
two
years
and that one-third
would like to hire more
foreign
workers. About half of the
foreign
workers
employed by
these businesses were students.
Foreign
students are allowed
to work
twenty
hours
per
week in
Japan,
but 70
percent
in this
survey
were
illegal
aliens because
they
exceeded this limit. The number of
foreign
students and trainees
jumped during
the 1980s from less than
20,000
in
1983 to
65,000
in 1988.12
11
Japan
had 2.4 million business and tourist arrivals in
1988,
a
doubling
from 1.2 million
in 1980. Over one third of these arrivals were from Korea and Taiwan. About 8.4 million
Japanese
traveled abroad in 1988. Of the 1.9 million new or first time arrivals in
Japan
in
1988,
about half were tourists and one-third were business visitors.
12
Trainees in
Japan
are not
permitted
to be
paid wages
even if
they
receive
on-the-job
training.
The number of trainees doubled to
23,000
between 1983 and 1988.
CONFERENCE REPORT 181
Japan
is in the midst of a
vigorous
debate over
foreign
workers. On the
one side are
mosdy
small
employers
who face increased international
competition,
a reduced number of
entry-level Japanese
workers for un?
skilled
jobs,
and the
knowledge
that there are millions of
Filipino,
Bangladeshi,
and Chinese workers who are
eager
to fill unskilled
jobs
in
Japan.
On the other side are the
Japanese
who note that
Japan
has done a
poor job
of
integrating
the
700,000
second and third
generation
descen?
dants of Koreans
imported
before and
during
World War
II,
and
they
note
the failure of
European
countries to
get
their
guestworkers
to leave and
doubt that
Japan
can
prevent
unskilled workers from
setding.13*
14
The
government
has established a ten-member Commission to
study
a
consensus solution to labor
shortage complaints.
The
Japanese
Labor Min?
istry opposes guestworkers?it projects
a
shortage
of
500,000
workers
during
the
1990s,
but then notes that economic reforms could
help
to
eliminate labor
shortages
without
immigration.
For
example, reducing
agricultural protections
for
Japan's
4 million farmers could
provide
addi?
tional workers for labor-short
industry
and services.15
Similarly,
restructur?
ing
the distribution and retail sector from small
family-operated
businesses
into
U.S.-style superstores
would free
up many
of the
family
workers.
Japan's ruling
Liberal-Democratic
Party
is reluctant to
encourage
labor-dis?
placing
structural
changes
in
agriculture
and
retailing,
two of its
pillars
of
support.
The
Japanese government
has so far resisted
pleas
for
easy employer
access to unskilled
foreign
workers.
Instead,
a
government
booklet for small
13
Japan occupied
Korea from 1910 to the end of World War II. Most of the
700,000
Koreans
in
Japan
have refused to
give up
their Korean
nationality,
and
they
retain their Korean names.
As
foreigners
in
Japan, they
must be
fingerprinted
and
carry
alien
registration
cards. Third-
generation
Koreans?there were four in
May
1990?will no
longer
have to be
fingerprinted
{New
York
Times,
May
2, 1990,
p.
A5).
Some
internationaUy-minded Japanese
believe that
guestworkers might begin
to
change
Japanese prejudices against
outsiders.
However,
other
Japanese
believe that racial
homogeneity
is a
key
to
Japan's
economic
success,
and that racial and ethnic
diversity
hurt America's
ability
to
compete.
Former Prime Minister Nakasone in 1986 said that
"Blacks,
Puerto
Ricans,
and
Mexicans"
keep average
U.S. educational levels
low,
and
Justice
Minister
Kajiyama
in 1990
justified rounding-up illegal
alien Thai
prostitutes by drawing
a
parallel
to
Blacks,
arguing
that
when "Blacks move
in,
whites are forced out."
The United States
imposed
a land reform on
Japan
after World War II which has
given
Japan
about 4.5 million farms owned
by
their
operators.
These farms
average
about 1 hectare
or 2.5 acres each. Almost 90
percent
of these farmers are
part-time operators
whose nonfarm
income exceeds their farm
income;
in
densely-populated Japan,
farmers can commute to urban
jobs
and farm on weekends.
Many
full-time farmers are workers who retired from urban
jobs
in
their
50s;
their
average age
is 56.
However,
half of the farm work force is women in their 40s.
182 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
and medium-sized
employers offering
"3k"
jobs?dangerous (Kiken),
dirty
(Kitani),
and
demanding
or hard
(Kitsui)?told
the
employers
that
they
should correct "labor market mismatches" with new
technology
and
by
making
better use of women and older
Japanese
workers and not
depend
on
foreign
workers.
However,
many
academicians and
journalists
discuss
"the
inevitability
of
foreign
labor" and
"foreign
workers:
neighbors
of
tomorrow"
(Shimada, 1990:17-18).
Academic
working papers
assert that
"as
long
as
Japan
has a demand for
labor,
a
large
scale inflow of
migrant
workers from Asia is inevitable"
(Morita, 1990:11)
and then
they
outline
work-and-learn or other
guestworker programs
that admit
foreign
workers
but minimize their
negative
effects,
including
their settlement in
Japan.
The
sense that
foreign
workers are inevitable is
widespread:
there seems to be a
belief that an international and
open economy
should include
foreign
workers. The
government,
unions,
and the
population
at
large
seem to be
opposed
to the call for
guestworkers
made
by
business and some academi?
cians,
but a research institute funded
by
the
Japanese
Labor Union Confed?
eration,
which
opposes
the admission of unskilled
foreign
workers,
recommended in October 1990 the admission of unskilled
foreign
work?
ers.16
Japan
has the world's lowest
fertility
rate and
longest
life
expectancy,
guaranteeing
labor
shortage complaints
for the foreseeable future if eco?
nomic
growth
remains
high (Martin, 1989). Unemployment
has been at 2
to 3
percent during
the
1980s,
and is not
threatening
to rise
despite
the
energy price
hikes
occurring
in the fall of 1990. If
Japan
were to
import
guestworkers,
and if it added 10
percent
of
foreign
workers to its work force
(as many European
countries did in the
early 1970s) Japan
would have 6
million
foreign
workers.
Singapore
The
city-state
of
Singapore
has doubled its
foreign
work force from
72,000
in 1970 to
150,000
in
1990,
and reduced its
dependence
on
Malays,
who are
now half of
Singapore's foreign
workers
(Fong, 1990).
Most of
Singapore's
foreign
workers are
unskilled;
perhaps
25,000
are skilled and
professional
workers.
Singapore
has one of the most interventionist
guestworker policies
in the world: it has
separate systems
for
professional
and unskilled
foreign
workers,
and its micro
management
of unskilled
foreign
workers includes
sectoral limitations
(they
can work
only
in
hotels,
manufacturing,
construc?
tion,
and as domestic
maids),
per
worker levies or taxes to
equalize
the cost
of foreign and domestic workers
(S$300
in August
1990),
and a ceiling of
16
Wall Street
Journal,
October
16, 1990,
p.
A27.
CONFERENCE REPORT 183
70
percent foreign
workers in
any
firm
(but
no
quota
on the total number
of
foreign
workers in the
country).17 Singapore
enforces
foreign
worker
rotation,
increasing
the
training, transportation,
and tax costs of
employers,
but rotation maintains
foreign
workers as a flexible buffer work force that
can be sent home when
they
are no
longer
needed. Unskilled
foreign
workers are not
permitted
to settle or to
bring
their families to
Singapore,
and even
marriage
to a
Singaporean
does not confer an automatic
right
of
residence in
Singapore.
As the number of unskilled
foreign
workers rose
during
the
1970s,
Singapore
in 1981 announced a
plan
to
stop recruiting
unskilled
foreign
workers
by
1991.
Employers protested
and,
instead of
shrinking,
the num?
ber of
foreign
workers
jumped
to
160,000
or 11
percent
of the work force
in 1984. The 1986 recession sent
50,000
foreign
workers
home,
but
by
1989
their number was back
up
to
161,000.
Illegal immigration
became a
problem
in the 1980s. In March
1989,
Singapore
announced that
illegal
aliens would receive a
mandatory
three-
month
jail
term and three strokes of the cane.18 An
amnesty
before the law
came into effect
produced
11,800
illegal
aliens,
about half
Thais,
more than
expected.
However,
when a Thai
illegal
alien worker was sentenced in
June
1989 to three months in
jail
and three-cane
strokes,
the Thai
government
protested
the
corporal punishment
and
pointed
out that
Singaporean
em?
ployers
were not
subject
to cane strokes for
knowingly hiring illegal
aliens.
In
July-August
1989,
Singapore
had a second
amnesty,
which
produced
another 500
illegal
aliens,
and
Singapore
announced that henceforth em?
ployers
who
knowingly
hire five or more
illegal
alien workers would be
caned.
In contrast to its
tightly regulated
unskilled
foreign
worker
program,
Singapore
has a liberal
policy
toward skilled and
professional foreign
workers. In
August
1989,
Singapore
announced that
college-educated per?
sons
earning
at least
S$ 1,500
per
month could
apply
for
permanent
resi?
dence. This
policy
was
designed
to attract educated
Hong Kong
residents,
where it has been received
enthusiastically,
and
may
send
25,000
immigrant
families or
100,000
people
to
Singapore
in the 1990s. Skilled
Hong Kong
residents
may
receive the
right
to
immigrate immediately,
but
they
do not
17
$1.00
U.S.
equaled
S$1.70
in November 1990.
18
Cane strokes are
applied
with a wood stick soaked in
water,
so that the flesh is
removed,
leaving
a
permanent
scar.
Caning
often leads to
hospitalization.
It is believed that the
Singaporean government
has located and caned several
illegal
alien workers since the summer
1989
dispute
with
Thailand,
but
canings
are no
longer publicized
because
they
are not a
deterrent to some Indian and Thai
workers,
for
example.
No
employer
has
yet
been
caned,
so
it is not
yet
resolved
exactly
who an
employer
is;
for
example,
who in a
corporation
is to be
caned if five or more
illegal
aliens are found
employed?
184 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
have to move to
Singapore
for five
years.
There is some concern that such
an influx of Chinese
immigrants may upset Singapore's
ethnic
balance,
which is
currendy three-quarters
Chinese.
Singapore
has a two-tiered
foreign
worker
policy, encouraging
the
entry
and setdement of skilled
immigrants
and
permitting
the
entry
of unskilled workers but
discouraging
their settlement. Few other
governments
have
Singapore's
confidence that
foreign
workers can be
regulated exacdy
as
anticipated.
However,
in an
apparent
concession to setdement
pressures, Singapore
is
encouraging
unskilled
foreign
workers to
upgrade
their skills and then settle in
Singa?
pore.
The
major problems
in
Singapore
are the
foreign
worker
levy
and the
foreign policy consequences
of
Singapore's illegal
alien
policies. Singapore
has no minimum
wage,
so when the
government
raised the
foreign
worker
levy
to
discourage
the recruitment of unskilled
workers,
employers simply
cut
wages
to
recoup
the
levy
from the
foreign
workers
they
continued to
import;
in
construction,
for
example, wages
fell from
S$23
daily
to
S$16
daily.
A tax
levy designed
to
change employer
behavior
away
from reliance
on unskilled
foreign
workers fails if
employers simply
take the
levy
from
the
workers,
so the
Singapore levy
has
become,
in most
cases,
simply
a
way
to reduce the
wages
earned
by foreign
workers without
discouraging
em?
ployers
from
hiring
them.
Second,
Singapore
did not
anticipate
the
vigorous
1989 Thai
protests
to
caning illegal
aliens.
Singapore
learned that its
domestic
management
of
foreign
workers had
foreign policy consequences.
Hong Kong
Like
Singapore, Hong Kong
has had a
tight
labor market since the 1970s?a
two-tiered
foreign
worker
policy
with
easy entry
of skilled and
professional
workers,
and the
emigration
to the United
States, Canada,
and Australia of
some of its
professionals (Yeh, 1990). However,
most of
Hong Kong's
immigrants
come from
China,
and
Hong Kong
will become a
Special
Administrative
Region
of China on
July
1,
1997.
Until October
1980,
Hong Kong
had a "touch base"
policy
toward
Chinese
nationals?illegal
aliens that
got
into
Hong Kong
could remain as
legal immigrants.
However,
when
170,000
Chinese arrived in
1979,
the
squatter population jumped
from
300,000
in 1978 to
750,000
in 1980 and
Hong Kong toughened
its
policies
toward Chinese nationals.
Hong Kong employers wishing
to hire skilled and
professional
workers
can
get
an
approval
or certification from the Director of
Immigration
for
the alien
they
wish to
hire,
and the alien then
gets
an
employment
visa.19
Until
1990,
the
only
unskilled workers admitted to
Hong Kong
were
39
United
Kingdom passport
holders can enter and work in
Hong Kong
without restriction.
CONFERENCE REPORT 185
"domestic
helpers"
or maids.
Originally begun
as a
program
to
get English-
speaking
maids for
English-speaking
families,
the number of
newly
admit?
ted
legal
maids
jumped
from
2,000
in 1976 to
44,000
in
1989,
bringing
the
total to
58,000,
mostly Filipinos. Employers
must
provide housing
and
pay
a minimum
wage
of
HK$3,000
per
month,
and the
government
has a
dispute
resolution service to deal with
complaints
from maids.20
Filipino
maids in
Singapore
and
Hong Kong
also have a union to
represent
them.
In
May
1989,
the
Hong Kong government
announced a
program
to
import up
to
3,000
skilled workers in a transitional
program
while
compa?
nies
complaining
of labor
shortages developed labor-saving
or
training
alternatives.
However,
employers immediately applied
for
8,500 workers,
and in
May
1990 the
government responded
with an
enlarged program
to
admit
up
to
14,700
skilled and semiskilled
workers?2,700
skilled
workers,
10,000
semiskilled
(machine operators
with at least one
year's experience),
and
2,000
airport
construction workers. These
foreign
workers must be
housed
by
the
employer
for free or at a cost
regulated by
the
government
and be
paid wages
at least
equal
to the median
wage published by
the
government
for that
occupation.
After six
months,
Hong Kong employers
applied
for
57,000
foreign
workers,
or four times the annual
quota,
launch?
ing
a debate over whether more
foreign
workers should be admitted.
Hong Kong
and
Singapore
are small economies
(Hong Kong
has a labor
force of almost 3
million,
Singapore
has 1.5
million)
that are successful
manufacturing export platforms;
that
is,
materials and
components
are
brought
to both
countries, assembled,
and then
exported.
In both
areas,
there have been
persisting
labor
shortages
that were
usually
satisfied
by
importing
workers from a
neighboring country?China
to
Hong Kong,
and
Malaysia
to
Singapore.
Both countries
adopted
new
policies
in
1989-90;
Singapore
enacted the
foreign
worker tax or
levy
and introduced new
measures
against illegal
aliens,
while
Hong Kong cautiously expanded
its
foreign
worker
program
from maids to skilled and semiskilled workers.
Filipinos
loom
large
in the ever more diversified
foreign
work force of both
areas.
Conference
participants
felt that
Hong Kong's
minimum
wage system
better
protected foreign
workers than
Singapore's foreign
worker
levy.
Indeed,
the difference between these areas' control mechanisms illustrates
the different
goals
of
foreign
worker
policies: Singapore
is
primarily
inter?
ested in its own
economy
and believes that it can
regulate foreign
worker
entry
and settlement with
precision,
while
Hong Kong's policy
was
subject
to more debate before
being implemented
and includes
quotas
and
wage
protections sought by Hong Kong
unions.
20
$1.00
U.S. is
equal
to
HK$7.8,
so
HK$3,000
is
equal
to
$385.
186 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
Malaysia
Malaysia
has about half of Asia's
foreign
workers,
but their status and effects
are not well documented.
Malaysia
is a resource-rich
country
of 17 million.
About 80
percent
of the
population
lives on the
Malay peninsula
or West
Malaysia,
which is
separated
from East
Malaysia
in North Borneo
by
900
miles of the South China Sea. The
Malaysian population
is 56
percent Malay,
33
percent
Chinese,
and 10
percent
Indian and other. The
Malays
tend to
engage
in
peasant agriculture,
the Chinese have urban
businesses,
and the
Indians often do farm work on estates.
Before
independence
in
1957,
the British
imported
Chinese, Indian,
and
Japanese
workers to work on rubber
plantations
and estates.
Malaysia
adopted
a New Economic
Policy
in
1971,
and rural
Malays began migrating
to urban areas for
factory jobs.
The
semigovernmental agencies
which
operate
the rubber
plantations
now face labor
shortages,
since the children
of
peasants
and estate farmworkers
prefer steady monthly jobs
and salaries
in urban factories to uncertain and
daily
farm
wages.
The
plantations
have
once
again begun
to
import Filipino
and Indonesian
workers,
so that
today
three
quarters
of
Malaysia's
farmworkers are
foreign
workers.
The number of
foreign-born persons
in
Malaysia
declined between 1970
and 1980
according
to the Census of
Population,
but this
apparent
decline
simply
reflects the undercount of
illegal foreign
workers
(Abella, 1990:12).
A 1968
Employment
Restriction Act
requires
resident
foreigners
who are
salaried workers to have work
permits,
and there were
18,000
such workers
in 1987. But resident workers with manual
jobs
in
agriculture
and construc?
tion do not need such
permits. Temporary
workers need to have
only passes,
and about
70,000
foreigners
have such
passes.
These data
suggest
that there are fewer than
100,000
legal foreign
workers in
Malaysia,
but the estimated number of
illegal migrants
in
Malaysia ranges
from
200,000
to 1 million
(Abella, 1990:12,
calls
400,000
conservative). By
one
estimate,
there are
perhaps
350,000
illegal
In?
donesians, 100,000
Filipinos,
and several hundred thousand Thais.
Malaysia's
ethnic
politics
have made these estimates a
political
issue.
Chinese
politicians generally
overestimate the number because most of the
immigrants
are Indonesian and
Filipino
Muslims,
and the Chinese
argue
that because the
immigrants
are fellow Muslims the
Malay-dominated
government
does not take
vigorous
action to reduce the
illegal immigration
which
may
add 1
percent
to the
Malaysian population
each
year. Malaysia
had amnesties for
illegal
aliens in 1986 and
1990,
but the
high
cost of
legalization
under these
programs
meant that most aliens remained in an
illegal
status.
Malaysia
has an
employer
sanctions
law,
but it is
apparently
CONFERENCE REPORT 187
not enforced.
Malaysia's long
coastline and the historical
affinity
between
Malays
and
Indonesians,
make it hard to
promote
a
vigorous anti-illegal
immigration policy.
Malaysia
also
exports
workers. Over
80,000
Malaysians
are
employed
in
Singapore
at
wages
that are about twice
Malaysian
levels. Another several
thousand
Malays
are
employed
in Middle Eastern
countries,
and there
may
be
1,000
illegal
alien
Malaysians
in
Japan. Malaysians
of Chinese
origin
appear
most
likely
to
emigrate.
LABOR EXPORTERS
There are three
types
of Asian labor
exporters:
countries which both
export
and
import
labor,
but are net
importers (Malaysia);
countries which both
export
and
import
labor,
but are on balance
exporters (Thailand,
and soon
Korea);
and classic labor
exporters
such as the
Philippines, Bangladesh,
and
Pakistan.
Malaysia exports professional
workers to the United States and
other industrial countries as well as skilled and semiskilled labor to
Singa?
pore,
but
imports
more unskilled
Indonesian, Thai,
and
Filipino
workers
than it
exports.
Thailand is a net labor
exporter,
but
rapid
economic
growth
has led to labor
shortages
and an influx of workers from Burma and
Cambodia. These
immigrant
workers,
as well as landless
Thais,
work on the
northeastern farms that are owned
by land-owning migrants
who are in the
Middle East.
Thailand,
with a
population
of 56 million and a work force of
29 million
(83 percent
in rural
areas),
sent
125,000
migrant
workers abroad
in 1989. Half went to Saudi
Arabia;
only
20
percent
went to Asian destina?
tions such as
Singapore,
Brunei and
Hong Kong (Tingsabath, 1990.A7).
Korea first sent 240
migrant
workers to West
Germany
in 1963
and,
since
then,
about 1.7 million Korean
migrants
have remitted
$16
billion to Korea
(Park, 1990).
Korea sends
primarily project-tied migrants, especially
to the
Middle Eastern countries which took two thirds of the Korean
emigrants.
Most of these men had two or
three-year
contracts to build a
factory,
hotel
or
road,
for
example.
The Korean
government required
all
migrants
to have
contracts that established minimum
wages
and maximum hours
(eleven
hours
daily),
but these standards were violated
routinely, especially
in the
Middle East.
However,
when Korean workers
protested
these contract
violations,
as in
Jubeil
in
1978,
labor
importers
threatened to bar the
importation
of Korean workers unless these labor
disputes stopped,
which
they
did after the Korean
government
intervened,
usually against
the
protesting migrants.
In
1989,
Korean
employment
reached 17.5
million,
the
unemployment
rate fell to 2.6
percent,
and there were fears of labor
shortages
in the 1990s
188 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
if economic
growth
continues at 10
percent annually (Park, 1990:47).
Korean
manufacturing
and construction
employers complained
that
they
needed about 5
percent
more workers in
1989,
and these labor
shortages
are
expected
to become more acute as Korea tries in the 1990s to build 2
million more houses and
improve
its infrastructure.21 The demand for
construction workers in Korea is reflected in their
declining
number abroad:
in
1983,
about 42
percent
of the
225,000
Korean workers abroad were
construction
workers;
by
1989,
only
10
percent
of
76,000
were construction
workers
(Park, 1990:9).
Korea is
debating
whether to
import
unskilled
workers in the 1990s from
China,
for
example,
but
uncertainty
about
possible
reunification with North Korea will
probably preclude importing
workers for at least a few more
years despite
labor
shortage complaints.
The
Philippines, Bangladesh,
and Pakistan are classic labor
exporters
in
that each sends 10 to 30
percent
of their annual labor force entrants abroad.
The
Philippines processed
3 million workers for overseas
employment
between 1975 and
1987,
and 85
percent
went to the Middle East
(Go,
1990:3).
In
1987,
about
425,000
workers were
processed
for overseas
employment. Filipinos
who work abroad are
mosdy young (56 percent
are
20 to
29)
men and women whose skills are bimodal:
they
include fourth
grade only
unskilled workers and maids as well as
college graduate
nurses.
A
frequent complaint
of
migrant
workers in the
Philippines
and other
labor-exporting
countries is the
high
cost of
getting
a contract for an
overseas
job.
The
Philippines
sets a maximum recruitment fee of
P5,000
(about $250),
but workers
report paying
two or three times more to
get jobs
which
pay
about
$250
monthly;
that
is,
workers
pay up
to 25
percent
of their
first
year's earnings just
to
get
a contract to
go
overseas.
Reports
of workers
who
paid
fees to
go
abroad but never
got
a contract are common.
Filipino
women
reportedly prefer
to be maids in
Singapore
or
Hong Kong
instead
of the Middle
East,
but recruitment fees are almost three times
higher
to
get
Asian versus Middle Eastern
jobs.
Bangladesh
is a
relatively
new labor
exporter,
but it has
emerged
as one
of the lowest-cost sources of unskilled workers and in 1989 sent
106,000
workers
abroad,
40
percent
to Saudi Arabia
(Mahbub, 1990:14).
Remit?
tances are about
$800
million
annually,
or
equal
to 50 to 60
percent
of the
value of
Bangladesh exports. Bangladesh
runs a
significant
trade deficit
21
In November
1990,
Korea announced
plans
to scrutinize new arrivals from Southeast
Asia to reduce
illegal
alien
workers;
almost
1,000
illegal
alien manual workers were
apprehended
in
1990,
and one-third were
Filipinos.
Korea
plans
to raise fines on
illegal
alien workers from
$4,200
to
$7,000
and
up
to three
years
in
jail.
Korean
employers
who hire
illegal
aliens can be
fined
$4,200
and
imprisoned
for
up
to three
years.
Wall Street
Journal,
November
27, 1990,
p.
All.
CONFERENCE REPORT 189
each
year,
and this deficit is
only partially
covered
by
remittances and
foreign
aid. Some
Bangladeshis argue
that countries which
export
to
Bangladesh
should
accept migrant
workers so their remittances can
pay
for the
exports.
Japan,
for
example, exports
five times more to
Bangladesh
than it
imports,
and current
Bangladesh
remittances from
Japan pay
for
just
5
percent
of
these
Japanese imports. Bangladesh migrants
are
eager
to work in
Japan:
the
per capita wage gap
is about 80 to one?one of the
highest
in the
world?and
Bangladesh
would like to
export
more of its workers to
Japan
and elsewhere.22
Both
Bangladesh
and Pakistan have been
exporting
about one
quarter
of their annual labor force
growth.
Pakistan's annual exit was over
150,000
in the
early
1980s,
dipped
to
58,000
in
1986,
and was
96,000
in 1989
(Azam,
1990:14).
The
percentage
of
migrants
who are laborers has fallen from
one-half in the
early
1980s to one-third in the late
1980s,
and the
percentage
of
migrants
who are
drivers, clerks,
and tailors has increased. Because of
their
patriarchal kinship systems,
neither
Bangladesh
nor Pakistan send
female
migrants
abroad,
explaining why
female
migrants
in the Gulf States
tend to be
Filipino,
Thai,
or Sri Lankan.
Like
Korea,
Pakistan
requires migrants
to have a contract which
guaran?
tees minimum
wages
and
working
conditions before
going
abroad;
in
Pakistan,
migrants
with
approved
contracts
get
a Protector of
Immigrants
stamp
in their
passports.
However,
a
significant
fraction of Pakistani mi?
grants apparendy
leave without
approved
contracts;
a
survey
of returned
migrants
in the mid-1980s found that
only
half had
approved
contracts when
they
left Pakistan. As in the
Philippines,
Pakistani workers often exit without
contracts because the cost of
getting
a contract to work abroad
may
be 10
to 30
percent
of the first
year's earnings.
There were
90,000
Pakistanis in Kuwait when
Iraq
invaded in
August
1990,
and about
70,000
have returned to Pakistan. The initial
attempt
to
fly
migrants
from
Jordan proved
too
expensive,
so most Pakistani
migrants
returned
by taking
their autos and what household
goods they
could over?
land
through Iraq, Turkey,
and Iran. Pakistan
permitted returning migrants
to avoid normal tariffs and customs duties on
goods brought
back
by
this
land route.23 Pakistan is
currendy estimating
the losses
experienced by
its
returning migrants,
and it reckons that its remittances will decrease
by
$1.6
billion in 1990.
22
Koga (1990) reported
that
Bangladesh
workers earned about
$7
per
hour in 1989 in small
manufacturing plants
near
Tokyo.
23
In addition to
losing
their
contracts,
Pakistani and other
migrants
in Kuwait saw the value
of their
savings
in Kuwaiti dinars devalued
by
90
percent
when
Iraq replaced
the Kuwaiti dinar
with its own
currency
at a 1 to 1 rate versus the
preinvasion
1 to 10 rate.
190 INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
There were between 3 and 3.5 million Asian
migrants
in the Middle East
when
Iraq
invaded Kuwait in
August
1990.
Amjad (1990:5) reports
that India
had
800,000
to 1 million
migrants
in the Gulf
States,
Pakistan
850,000
to
1.1
million,
the
Philippines
700,000
to
800,000,
Bangladesh
250,000
to
300,000,
Sri Lanka
200,000
to
300,000
and
Indonesia, Korea,
and China
less than
100,000
each. Remittances to the Asian countries of
origin
of these
migrants
were as much as
$10
billion
annually during
the 1980s. Unlike
Arab labor
migration
to the Gulf
States,
Asian labor
migration
was much
more
organized,
with Korea
being
the most
organized exporter
of labor and
Thailand
having
the least
governmental
involvement in labor
emigration.
Few Asian countries have
programs
and
policies
which can translate
remittances and returned
migrants
into
sparkplugs
for
job-creating
devel?
opment.
Government
programs
which assist returned
migrants
are some?
times resented
by
other nationals because the returned
migrants
are in most
cases better off than
nonmigrants.
However,
without effective
development
strategies
for both
migrants
and
nonmigrants,
remittances wind
up being
spent
without
launching stay-at-home development.
There
appears
to be
little research and few
policy suggestions
for
using
the window of
opportu?
nity provided by
remittances and returned
migrants
to accelerate Asian
development.
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Conference
participants agreed
that Asia is
joining
the Middle East as a
major
destination for Asian
migrants
in the 1990s. There are now about 1
million
migrant
workers in the four
major
Asian
labor-importing
countries,
but half are
illegal
aliens in
Malaysia.
The
major
new destination
may
be
Japan:
it will continue to have labor
shortages
in the
1990s,
and if it decides
to
cope
with these labor
shortages by importing migrant
workers,
Japan
could
import
in the 1990s more than the 2 million
migrants
in Saudi Arabia.
Japan
seems to be divided on whether to become a
labor-importing
country
in the 1990s. Like
Singapore
and
Hong Kong, Japan
now
provides
relatively easy entry
for
professional migrants.
However,
most of the
80,000
legal foreign
workers in
Japan,
as well as most of the
65,000
foreign
students
and trainees and most of the
200,000
illegal
aliens,
are unskilled workers.
Japan
has indicated that it is
willing
to
import
unskilled workers
by granting
automatic work and settlement
rights
to South American residents of
Japanese
descent,
for
example,
but
Japan
has not
yet
decided whether to
import
unskilled workers from other countries who
may
settle in
Japan.
Japan
seems to be less confident than
Singapore
that it can rotate
migrants
and
prevent
settlement,
and less interested than
Hong Kong
in
migrant
maids,
but
very
worried about the settlement of
migrant
workers?the most
CONFERENCE REPORT 191
often
repeated example
of what
Japan
does not want is the Turkish workers
who settled in
Germany.
While
Japan
debates whether to
import
unskilled
migrant
workers in the
1990s,
the Asian labor
exporters
that became accustomed to
exporting
10
to 30
percent
of their annual labor force
growth
to Middle Eastern countries
in the 1980s are
looking
for new destinations as the demand shrinks in the
Middle East. These countries would like to
go
on
exporting
workers to earn
remittances and to reduce their
unemployment despite
the
widely
acknowl?
edged
human and social costs of
emigration
due to
family separation
at
home and mistreatment abroad.
Emigration
and remittances seem to have
become institutionalized in some of the Asian
labor-exporting
countries,
but
there have been few studies of the local and
regional
effects of
emigration
and litde
thought given
to what
development
efforts should be undertaken
if
opportunities
for
emigration
diminish.
Conference
participants thought
that the current
uncertainty
about
whether the destination of Asian
migrants
will shift from the Middle East
offers a
unique opportunity
to reassess international
migration
for
employ?
ment. Potential labor
importers
such as
Japan
can determine the
pros
and
cons of
importing
workers under the
higher
standards
expected by
labor
exporters.
In
Japan's
case,
Asian labor
exporters promise
to be
especially
sensitive about the treatment of their nationals in
Japan
because of
Japan's
often harsh
occupation
of their countries in World War II. If
Japan
and other
Asian countries
emerge
as 1990s destinations for
migrant
workers,
labor
exporters hope
that bilateral and multilateral
agreements
can deal with both
the
specific problems
that have arisen with
migration
to the Middle
East,
such as recruitment costs and mistreatment
abroad,
and the more
general
issue of how to
organize emigration
so that
exporting
workers becomes a
road to economic
development
rather than a
path
to continued
dependence
on
foreign
labor markets.
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