Swarm Aid

Dilip Ratha, a World Bank economist who specializes in migration, estimates that migrant workers direct an astounding $330 billion flow back to their home countries. To properly appreciate the figure, if you add up all the foreign aid given to developing nations in the world, you only reach $100 billion. Ratha, on his blog People Move, estimates that money from remittances may reach a tenth of the global population. One of the largest motors of the global economy is being driven by a hidden consensus among the world’s undocumented, poor, and unrepresented. This conglomeration is characterized by its

swiftness: they react instantaneously to new economic possibilities and realities

self-sacrifice: evidence suggests that remittances actually increase during economic downturns, meaning that workers actually send more money to family members during times of hardship.

and vulnerability: denied rights and protections, we know the story of immigrant workers.

The collapse of the construction industry in Dubai has generated a peculiar phenomenon, an airport parking lot filled with cars abandoned by fleeing workers: