On April 25th, the migrant workers of Korea had a protest in Seoul asking for proper dormitories and the right to work. On December 20th, 2020, a migrant worker in Pocheon-si, Gyeonggi-do, died in the vinyl greenhouse, which migrant workers used as their dormitory. Like the vinyl greenhouse dormitory, migrant workers’ flawed dormitory system was controversial, but nothing has changed. In addition to the problem of the dormitory, overwork, violent language, violence, and many other problems are also infringing on migrant workers’ rights. While they are already struggling with the unfamiliar language, culture, more obstacles are enhancing the problem. Then what are the hardships migrant workers are struggling with?

　The first problem that makes migrant workers struggle is the weak law system for them. According to the Law of Employment of Foreign Workers, a labor contract by the Ministry of Employment and Labor Ordinance is mandatory to hire foreign workers. Nevertheless, according to the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs (KIHSA) survey on May 12th, 40.3% of migrant workers never signed the contract. If an employee does not sign the contract, the employer can fire the worker anytime for no reason, and his or her wage is not guaranteed. Also, deprivation of the right of changing workplace of the “*Employment Permit System (EPS)” is harassing migrant workers. Deprivation of the right of changing workplace states that a migrant worker cannot change his or her workplace by himself or herself, and he or she can only change when the government concedes the employee’s insistence. Which means the physical pains and mental illnesses occurring from the workplace are not are not acceptable reasons for changing their workplace. In one case, a migrant worker wanted to change his workplace because he was in pain from his employer’s continuous unfair demands and threats but he was not approved due to lack of acceptance by the government. If a migrant worker leaves the workplace without permission, he or she may be treated as an illegal immigrant. For these reasons, migrant workers have to tolerate everything not to be illegal immigrants. Park Jung-Hyung (Director of Korea Migrant Human Rights Center) said, “Because of the deprivation of the right of changing workplace of EPS, it is hard for migrant workers to claim their rights. The government has to abolish the deprivation of the right to change the workplace to save migrant workers’ rights.”

　Secondly, the labor background is also intruding on migrant workers’ rights. According to “Gyeonggi-do Provincial Government Report on Labor Dispatch of Migrant Workers,” 57.9% of migrant workers are overworked, and 30% of them are not getting paid for the extra work properly. In addition, In KIHSA’s survey, 24.6% of workers have worked more than 52 hours per week, which is the legal hours of work per week, and 20.7% of workers answered they worked even up to 60 hours. 19.8% of migrant workers have experienced unfair dismissal, verbal and physical violence in the workplace, and more violations. Especially 2.3% of female migrant workers have experienced sexual harassment or sexual assault. In March, a woman migrant worker from Cambodia reported that she was continuously threatened and sexually assaulted by her employer. Director Park said, “Also, their employers are making wrong use of EPS, so they are the ones who are not guaranteeing their workers’ rights. Therefore, many employers had been threatening many foreign workers at work like ‘Go back to your country, I will make you go back to your country’. To save the migrant workers, we need many improvements in labor environments and also basic residential environments.”

　Lastly, prejudice is the problem. Until these days, numerous people treat migrant workers as strangers or as a band of criminals. According to the big data report based on Twitter in 2017 by Twitter, the words like “Southeast Asia, humble, disapprove, disgust, deportation” showed relevance to the word “Foreign worker.” Due to this, we need more education for people to encourage a positive recognition of migrant workers. Chun Jung-Hee (Director of the center, Gimhae Support Center for Foreign Workers) said, “We now are living in a global world. Therefore, we need more training to encourage the positive recognition of foreigners, including migrant workers.”

　Kim In-Sun (Counselor, Busan Foreign Residents Center) said, “The acceptable reasons for the deprivation of the right of changing workplace, of EPS, are the company strike, the serious injury, or other special events. Also, I think the labor environment problem has a relationship with EPS. The employers’ wrong uses of EPS are giving migrant workers extra time of work, and hard work. I think the employers’ way of treating migrant workers is affecting the prejudice of migrant workers. Above all, If the government gives them free rights to change the workplace, it is going to decrease the violations of rights of migrant workers.”