Bracero What Is the Bracero Program? What

Bracero

What is the Bracero Program? What happened to the Braceros both in the U.S. And Mexico? What are your impressions of the people's experiences in the program? Should the U.S. create another "guest-worker" program?

The Bracero Program allowed migrant unskilled laborers from Mexico, primarily in the agricultural sector, to work temporarily in the United States. The program was a mutual agreement between the American and Mexican governments after the Second World War. The Braceros provided cheap labor to help build American infrastructure, and it was mainly Americans and not the Mexicans who benefitted. In fact, the Bracero system channeled labor that was needed to build Mexican infrastructure to the United States. Braceros in the United States and Mexico met with mixed fates. Some remained in the United States and caused later waves of immigration, usually illegal, after the Bracero program was dismantled. This was because families had been torn apart during the height of the program, and rather than return to communities that had been thoroughly impoverished, many Mexicans opted instead to migrate.

Guest worker programs sound promising on paper, and when they are implemented properly, they can be beneficial to multiple parties. The migrant laborers earn much-needed cash and they can then re-invest that cash into their communities at home. However, the potential problems with guest worker programs might outweigh the potential benefits. In the case of Mexico, it may be preferable to help Mexican communities build infrastructure rather than continue to solicit cheap labor. Another option would be to create cross -- border collectives in which migrant laborers directly invest their earnings back in their Mexican communities. As they stand now, the Bracero-type programs perpetuate poverty on both sides of the border.

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