The street, the agency and the workers’ centre
This article analyzes the day-labourer job allocation system in the United States, whose workforce is often made up of undocumented Hispanic migrants. Using five case studies, it compares informal hiring carried out in parking lots or in front of large stores, with day labour formally organized by commercial agencies on the one hand, and hiring through self-governed community centres on the other. The study of alternative services offered by community intermediaries shows that they are subjected to the same constraints as commercial intermediaries and reproduce certain of the latter’s traits, but at the same time, they provide key services to day labourers and build a solid base for their legal and political mobilization, whether it is for the right to seek employment in a public area, recover unpaid salaries, or demand reforms that would allow them to regularize their migratory status.