Earlier this week, a shocking video was posted on Twitter of an international student being slapped by her employer for demanding she get paid her promised $10 an hour (well below the minimum wage):
She’s an international student who worked in a bubble tea shop located at Adelaide CBD,being paid $10/hr for couple days but her boss paid her nothing,when she strikes back and demands her boss to pay her ,she’s being abuse,slap,punch and kick pic.twitter.com/6h97z3KRL8
— Jackie Chen (@JackieC66279065) February 1, 2021
Sadly, such exploitation of international students has become commonplace in Australia, typically by migrant employers of the same nationality.
Former ACCC head and chair of the Migrant Workers Taskforce, Alan Fels, raised the alarm two years ago:
Former consumer watchdog Allan Fels, who is leading the government’s Migrant Workers Taskforce, said he believed one-third of international students were being exploited, with an unpaid wages bill in the billions… [He estimated] up to 145,000 students on working visas are being underpaid by employers…
Professor Fels… said workplace exploitation of overseas students was “widespread and systematic”…
He said exploitation of international students by businesses owned by migrants from the same ethnic group was a particular problem…
In a similar vein, Honi Soit last year reported on a survey by Sydney University business school academic Stephen Clibborn, which found “out of 274 international students working part-time, 60 per cent were paid less than minimum wage, with 35 per cent paid $12 an hour or less”. It also noted that “the majority of this exploitation takes place in small businesses, especially in the retail and hospitality industry” and that “employers usually speak the language”.
In the wake of the above incident, Dr Joanna Howe – associate professor in Law at the University of Adelaide – has called for greater protections for international students:
There is now a wealth of evidence to demonstrate that international students have two key aspects to their vulnerability. First, they are vulnerable in terms of their accommodation and living arrangements as there is a lack of affordable, safe housing in our metropolitan cities. Second, international students are vulnerable in the labour market to wage theft and other forms of exploitation.
International students are routinely paid wages much lower than the legal minimum…
Paradoxically, given the high incidence of exploitation, international students are the least likely of all temporary migrants to report it to the Fair Work Ombudsman…
On the one hand, universities attract large numbers of international students by promising them a two-year post-study visa which allows them to work freely in the Australian labour market. On the other, once they’re in the labour market, we do not properly enforce their work rights, dropping them into the deep end in jobs that are typically underpaid and in industries with a history of poor compliance with the law…
The pause in international student arrivals caused by the pandemic offers an important opportunity for a reset and for the university sector to develop new initiatives and resources to address their vulnerability.
There are two key drivers of this exploitation that does not receive enough attention.
First, the financial requirements for international students to obtain a visa has been set far too low, which leaves them with insufficient resources to support themselves. According to University of Sydney associate professor, Dr Anna Boucher:
[Dr Boucher] said some people working in the sector believe the “asset testing” — or cost of living benchmark — for students looking to study in Australia was quite low.
“One argument is that they’re expected to be frugal, another is it’s unrealistic”…
“It allows a high number of students to gain admission, but then they’re really reliant on those part-time jobs…
So, when COVID hit, we witnessed the perverse situation where this so-called great “export” industry had hundreds of thousands of international students facing destitution after losing their jobs, and therefore demanding taxpayer welfare.
The second driver is that English-language proficiency for international students has been set far too low, which leaves students vulnerable to exploitation from employers of the same nationality and less likely to be able to stand up for their rights.
The obvious solutions are to: 1) substantially raise financial requirements for international students so that they can support themselves throughout their courses and are not dependent on working; and 2) raising English-language requirements, so that international students can properly participate in society.
These reforms would have four positive impacts.
First, they would reduce competition in the workplace, in turn providing more job opportunities for young Australians, who suffer from chronic labour underutilisation.
Second, they would dramatically reduce workplace exploitation, since international students would not need to take on illegal work to make ends meet and would not be tied to employers of the same nationality.
Third, it would maximise export revenues per student, given tuition fees and living expenses would be paid for primarily by funds from abroad, rather than from money earned within Australia.
Finally, it would lift the quality of student, since most would come to Australia for the primary purpose of studying (rather than for work and residency) and they would speak and understand English.
Wage theft is not a quirk of the system, it is the system. Failing to make fundamental reforms to Australia’s edu-migration system will only lead to more of the same, with endless hand wringing over stolen wages and exploitation.
