The Mental Health Effects of Maquiladora Work on Mexican Women :: Essays Papers

The Mental Health Effects of Maquiladora Work on Mexican Women Sources of Stress and its ConsequencesThe U.S.-Mexican borderline es una herida abierta where the Third humanity grates against the first and bleeds. . .-- Gloria Anzaldua IntroductionSubmerged in the impoverished urban border culture which they helped create, the maquiladoras draw young women north from in all over Mexicos interior. The women migrate with hopes of acquiring jobs in the booming foreign-owned factories and atomic number 18 plunged into a new border country that is far from a promised land. Maquiladoras be a financial endeavor for foreign industrialists who hope that by situating factories in Third World countries they will substantially cut output signal costs. The industrialists have been accused of pickings advantage of Mexicos cheaply accessible labor force and less restrictive health and safety codes in order to achieve these lower production costs. While preliminary surveys on the effects of maquiladora work on womens physical health show little to no adverse side effects, researchers and advocates atomic number 18 not completely convinced that long term health effects will prove positive. The emotional and psychological stresses of working(a) in a maquiladora are tremendous and should be examined just as seriously as the physical effects. The female workers live a life of insecurity, instability, oppression, submission, and exhaustion. They face jolting lifestyle changes and sluice when working full time, have trouble making enough money to cover basic living costs. They are pawns in a First World economic strategy that hopes to wring as much cheap labor out of the women as it can, paying female workers in Mexicos northern states an intermediate of only four dollars a day for workdays that typically run from 730 a.m. to 530 p.m.. High levels of stress accountable to both working in the maquiladora itself and the to lifestyle it promotes attribute to depression, sub stance abuse and even physically manifested ailments. This paper will examine the different sources of stress that affect the mental health of female maquiladora workers in an attempt to understand the overall health issues of the border culture. Overview of Potential Stressors Affecting Mental HealthA great majority of maquiladora employees are young women who have migrated to the border area from supporting agricultural regions (Cravey, 6). Migration, itself, is a complicated process which could have pro appoint affects on the mental health of maquiladora workers. Migration has been found to have negative effects