The recent report that Government was probing the living conditions of migrant construction workers in Barbados should not have surprised us as much as it did. Concerns had been raised about Colombian and Indian workers allegedly living in deplorable conditions connected to a local construction arrangement. Authorities became involved, and the company was reportedly ordered to relocate the workers.I wish I could say that I was shocked. Sadly, I am probably too jaded by these things to pretend so.
Across the world, large employers have long convinced themselves that cheap labour is harmless once the human being doing the work is kept out of sight. Qatar became the famous modern example because of the World Cup, when its construction boom placed migrant labour under scrutiny over wages, accommodation, heat and safety. Barbados is not Qatar. The scale is different, but the temptation is familiar: import workers, house them cheaply, work them hard, and then act surprised when the arrangement begins to look like something other than decent employment.
For all our small-island familiarity, we can become blind when the people doing the work are not from here. We see the wall going up, the roof being cast, the road being widened, and we call it development. We do not always ask who woke up before sunrise, what they ate, where they slept, or whether they have any practical power to complain.
Over the last few months, I have watched a project where foreign workers appear to begin around 6 a.m. and continue until about 6 p.m. That is not a labour-market survey. It is simply what I have seen often enough. In a Barbadian summer, with heat, dust, rain, concrete and pressure to finish the job, twelve-hour days should not be treated as harmless work ethic. At some point, productivity becomes exhaustion dressed up as discipline.
I have also seen foreign workers riding in large numbers on the open backs of trucks, unharnessed, heading to job sites across some of the worst roads in Barbados. It only takes one bad turn, one pothole, one sudden brake, and one worker falling from a truck for the matter to become not merely a labour issue, but a diplomatic controversy.
To be fair, migrant labour is not itself the problem. Barbados has always needed outside labour. Tourism, construction, agriculture, nursing, teaching and professional services have benefited from regional and international movement. A small economy with an ageing population and a limited skills base cannot pretend that all labour must be local.
The problem is when migrant labour is used not because the skills are unavailable locally, but because local workers will not accept the wage, hours, or treatment being offered.
Having taught labour economics at the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, for more than a decade, I naturally look at this less from industrial relations than from incentives. Employers respond to prices. Workers respond to wages, conditions, alternatives and dignity, though economists often place much of that under the term “reservation wage”.
A reservation wage is the lowest wage at which a person is willing to accept a job. It reflects transport costs, family responsibilities, discomfort, risk, pride, expectations and alternatives. A Barbadian artisan who can earn around $125 per day, work privately, migrate, drive a van, take a security job, work in tourism or simply refuse poor treatment may not accept a construction job below a certain wage. That does not mean the person is lazy. It means the offer has fallen below the point at which the job makes sense.
Imported labour may have a lower reservation wage when measured in Barbados dollars. That does not mean their lives are easier. A migrant worker may accept less because the alternative at home is worse, because the Barbados wage is valuable when remitted, because accommodation is tied to the job, because the contract is short, or because the worker has borrowed money to get here. Lower reservation wages are not always evidence of a healthy labour market. Sometimes they are evidence of vulnerability.
Classical economics gives us a clean way to think about the matter. If employers can access a larger pool of workers willing to work at lower wages, the effective supply of labour increases. If construction demand remains strong, the result should be more employment and slower wage growth than would otherwise occur. From the employer’s point of view, this looks efficient. Projects are completed. Labour shortages are reduced. Costs are controlled.
But the story is not finished there.
If local workers see wages being held down by cheaper imported labour, some will leave the industry. Others will avoid entering it. Some will emigrate or move into informal work where the daily return is higher. Over time, the local labour pool shrinks, not because Barbadians are allergic to work, but because the market keeps signalling that their labour is not valued at the price they require.
If poor housing, short-term insecurity and exploitative arrangements were removed, migrant wages should gradually move closer to what local workers are demanding. Decent accommodation, regulated transport, health and safety compliance, overtime, fair contracts and humane supervision all cost money. Once those costs are included, the supposed bargain begins to look less magical.
Yet Barbados may settle into a less attractive equilibrium. Migrant workers remain available. Local workers continue to exit. Employers complain that locals do not want to work. Wages for artisans hover around $120 or $125 per day for far too long, even as food, rent, transport and general living costs climb. That inflation problem is another article by itself.
So what should be done?For once, let me not end only with a sigh and a question.First, the Ministry of Labour should create a migrant-worker accommodation and transport compliance regime for larger employers. Not occasional visits after a scandal, but proper licensing and inspection covering housing, sanitation, occupancy, water, ventilation, transport, safety equipment and rest periods.
Second, migrant labour approvals should be tied to a demonstrated local wage test. Before large employers import workers for roles clearly fillable by local labour, they should show the wages, conditions and recruitment efforts offered locally. If no Barbadian wants the job at $80 per day, that is not evidence of a labour shortage. It may simply be evidence of a bad offer.
Thirdly, there must be an adjustment to the Construction Gateway Program in light of events. Construction firms, developers, technical institutes, unions and Government should continue to jointly finance this serious artisan pipeline but introduce productivity bonuses and clearer wage ladders.
The issue before us is not whether Barbados should use migrant labour. We will need migrant labour. The issue is whether we are using it to complement the local workforce or to quietly discipline it.
Because if the only way a project works is through low wages, long hours, weak transport safety and living conditions we would never accept for ourselves, then perhaps the project was never as efficient as it looked.
It was merely being subsidised by someone else’s discomfort.