Adopting a geographic lens to examine the employment of guestworkers in
the United States, Be Our Guest offers readers the most comprehensive
analysis of guestwork in tourism that has been produced to date. In
weaving together the constellation of political and economic factors
that exist across multiple scales, the case is made for how and why so
many tourism-dependent areas of the United States have developed a
dependency on temporary foreign workforces. Taking a holistic approach,
special emphasis is placed on the economic histories of these areas and
shifting patterns of employment, seasonality, gentrification, and
related housing shortages.
Throughout, the voices of stakeholders involved in every aspect of
guestwork are included: human resources managers battling labor
shortages, town planners mitigating workforce housing shortages, and
attorneys and advocates helping to directly assist migrant workers and
affect policy changes. These perspectives are coupled with detailed
analysis of state policies regarding guestworker visa programs and labor
market stress to illustrate a vivid picture of the precarious lives of
the migrant laborers who arrive in the United States.
Be Our Guest serves to specifically address a lacuna in critical
tourism studies and the growing concern among practitioners over
workforce quality and supply. Nevertheless, it will benefit everyone
with an interest in issues of labor migration, precarity, housing
policy, and immigration reform.
