Manufacturing jobs
The story that won the 2008 Emmy Award for Outstanding Continuous Coverage of a News Story and 2009 Hillman Award, Made in L.A, narrates the odyssey of three women Lupe Hernandez, Maura Colorado and Maria Piredo in their painstaking journey as immigrant workers in Los Angeles at the fashionable Forever 21. Herein we see how manufacturing jobs have been transformed to export labor where low and middle-class workers work for multinational companies for low wages and poor conditions. Further, we see that most worker unions are built on the principle of racism and managing labor that the main characters, although fighting and winning for their rights are not exempt from, and for that I think the future generation of immigrants will have to work harder for their civic rights.
Manufacturing jobs are long known to attract immigrates in the US and as the article Immigrant Cities as reservations for low wage labor supposes, the immigrant population have had to endure low wage and inhumane working conditions as part of their increasing numbers-a social issue the characters need to address. As we see in the movie, the three immigrant women are working in a garment factory (Forever 21) 10-14 hours a day often denied eating bathroom breaks as they also work overtime. It would be plausible to argue that while the cities have become revitalized due to immigrant surging population, their living conditions have dwindled. As the revitalization of these cities ensues with the more immigrant population we see that the business center has transformed from the exportation of manufactured goods to the exportation of labor where immigrants are oppressed. A good example in the movie is where we see the women Both the movie and readings reach a focal point where we get to see that only a labor union can save immigrant workers from their plight. In the movie, the workers unite at the Asian Pacific American Legal Center where they organize boycotts and protests. In the end, while the women emerge victorious in the fight for their rights with Lupe being the spokesperson for Garment Worker Center we get to see that to attain their rights, these women needed to stand up together in courage and unity so that a single voice could be heard.
While the movie gives one of the best happy endings where the protagonists can fight for their rights as immigrants through worker union, we also see that their younger generations, for instance, Maura’s children will have to work harder as foreign-born individuals in the corporate world to earn their dignity and pay. We see that the problem where the three women, all aged below 18 years, leave for America to fend for themselves and their families follows what Marxist theory would call social stratification where the society is made up of the high, middle and low class. Immigrants like Lupe, Maura, and Maria fall under the middle and low class hence the disenfranchisement and oppression. Why their children will have to work harder than they are what Brown and Jones narrate as the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance (MIRA) which is built on racism and managing labor (36). Lastly, considering that most immigrants like in the Made in LA are victims of immigrant policies that alienate them from other citizens when we explore whether such immigrants would volunteer for organizations, a study performed in six cities show that most immigrants would prefer to volunteer to international organizations than local organizations. This can be explained by the immigrant’s need to honor their tradition and civic engagement especially in the corporate world where they are important sources of labor as with the three immigrants..