Beyond the “Good Family” Lottery: Marketized Migration and the Depoliticization of Au Pair Precarity

• In Event: 41021 - Student Forum Refereed Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Roundtable 7: Work and Labor

Abstract

This study examines the U.S. Au Pair program, a temporary labor migration scheme framed as a “cultural exchange” but largely functioning as a market-driven labor source for inexpensive domestic work. By analyzing this program through the lens of David Cook-Martín’s marketized migration framework, this paper argues that the rhetoric of “cultural exchange” and being “one of the family” obscures labor relations, depoliticizing exploitation and shifting responsibility away from institutional oversight. The study uses Wendy Brown’s concept of depoliticization to explore how the program's ideological branding masks structural vulnerabilities, leaving au pairs exposed to exploitation and systemic inequities.

The U.S. Au Pair program, established in 1986 under the J-1 visa, allows young foreigners to provide childcare in exchange for room, board, and a stipend. Despite its cultural exchange claims, the program often denies labor protections and has become a means of affordable domestic labor. The paper highlights how private agencies and their practices shape the precarity of au pairs, who face low wages and potential deportation if they fail to secure a new host family. Early findings from interviews with 40 au pairs reveal significant gaps between the program’s promised benefits and the harsh realities, including financial inadequacy and blurred work-family boundaries. The study also discusses how au pairs attribute their experiences to luck and individual agency, revealing deeper issues of systemic neglect and exploitation.

Author

• Valentina Serrano Salomon, University of Colorado-Boulder