ABSTRACT
The work of immigrant women in the United States has always played a vital role in many areas of the economy, despite the often extreme hardships that confronted these workers. Generalizing about patterns of work among female immigrants is difficult because their circumstances have varied greatly by ethnicity, marital status, and other factors. Those that chose to work outside the home, however, shared a common experience of employment discrimination on the basis of racism, sexism, and xenophobia. Such discrimination often forced these women to work long hours in unsafe workplaces for very low wages. Immigrant women also often worked in repetitive manufacturing jobs, especially in the textile and garment industries, or in other unskilled and low-paying types of labor such as domestic service, laundering, prostitution, and childcare (Katzman 1981). These workers experienced significantly more exploitation, hazards, and abuses in the workplace than either native-born women or immigrant men. Other immigrant women chose not to work outside their own homes because of the cultural traditions of their ethnic groups or their personal preferences. These women, however, often did produce income by doing home-based manufacturing, helping in a family business, or taking in boarders (Daniels 1988).
