Remittances fall, sign of the slump

Posted on September 4, 2007 by grim

From the Herald News:

Fewer sending cash home, agencies say

Late summer is usually a time when Jose Cordero of Passaic sends extra money home to his family in Mexico.
…
When work is steady, Cordero wires home about $300 every week to 15 days. But the past few months he’s barely managed to send $150 to $200 at irregular intervals.

“The past three months have been really slow,” said Cordero, 38, who solicits work as a day laborer by the Passaic Home Depot. “There’s not much work, and when there’s no work, there’s less money to send, and everything else goes down.”

Late August and early September are the busiest times of the year — second only to Mother’s Day and the Christmas season — for money transfer agencies with largely Mexican clientele. But several agencies said they have noticed a drop-off in business in recent months.

“I’ve been working here for three years, and this is the worst year I’ve seen,” said Maribel Hernandez, who works at Calixto Express, a money transfer agency in Passaic. “The regular customers are sending with less frequency, and they are sending less money.”

Hernandez said she started sensing a downturn about three months ago.

“Here, at this agency at least, it’s off about 30 percent,” she said, “enough to be something we’ve noticed.”

A recent survey by the Inter-American Development Bank released in August, showed a significant decrease in remittances to Mexico and other Central American countries in immigrant communities across the United States.
…
Sixty-six percent of Mexican immigrants in traditional states like New Jersey said they sent remittances home this year, according to the report compared with 68 percent last year. But in so-called “new states,” the figure has dropped from 80 percent who sent money home last year to 56 percent this year.
…
As for the remittance issue, Pearson said he wondered if it’s not a sign of things to come for the overall U.S. economy. When those at the bottom rung of the pay scale start to show signs of economic distress, Pearson said, legal low-wage workers may not be far behind. The report found that 61 percent of Mexican immigrants reported making $20,000 or less each year and sending an average of $3,550 home annually.

This entry was posted in General. Bookmark the permalink.

15 Responses to Remittances fall, sign of the slump

  1. marilyn says:
    September 4, 2007 at 1:11 pm

    Middle class people can’t even save 100 dollars a week, these people can send home $300 dollars to Mexico? Something is wrong here.

  2. jcer says:
    September 4, 2007 at 4:19 pm

    Clearly you have never met a some of these mexican immigrants. Many work 2 jobs typically between 12-16 hr days, for something around $8-$10 per hour under the table. They live very inexpensively typically in areas like Union City or West New York in a crappy apt or shared place that costs like 500 per month for 2 people. They have no cars, take the bus, they live very cheaply > $1000 per month in living costs, sending money to their families. They scrape and save hoping either to return to mexico and start a business, live well etc.. or they are hoping to build a life in the US.

Comments are closed.