Philippine E-Journals

Master and Servant: Contradictory Roles of Migrant Filipina Domestic Workers

Mary Ann M. Bolante

Discipline: Society

 

Abstract:

The increasing number of migrant domestic workers leaving the country is now a new global trend. In the past, it was mainly men who went to countries far away; women came as followers. For the last 30 years, however, this has changed so much that today over half of all migrants are women. Furthermore, female migrants have often become the main or single wage earners of their families. Thus, the necessary conditions of work and survival fall increasingly on the shoulders of low-waged, deprived, and exploited migrant women (Gunduz, 2013). More Filipinas opted to work as domestic workers abroad because of poverty and lack of employment opportunities in the Philippines.