A commuter worker, also known as a cross-border commuter or alien commuter is a worker who is resident in a different country to that in which they work, and crosses a national border as part of their regular commute.

Examples

North America

Canada, Mexico and the United States

Thousands of workers who live in

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

cross the

Mexico–United States border The Mexico–United States border ( es, frontera Estados Unidos–México) is an international border separating Mexico and the United States, extending from the Pacific Ocean in the west to the Gulf of Mexico in the east. The border traver ...

daily to work in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. There are also workers who cross the

Canada–United States border The border between Canada and the United States is the longest international border in the world. The terrestrial boundary (including boundaries in the Great Lakes, Atlantic, and Pacific coasts) is long. The land border has two sections: Can ...

or other national borders. The practice of crossing the Mexico – United States border for work developed in the late 1920s, following the passing of the

1924 Immigration Act The Immigration Act of 1924, or Johnson–Reed Act, including the Asian Exclusion Act and National Origins Act (), was a United States federal law that prevented immigration from Asia and set quotas on the number of immigrants from the Eastern ...

, which substantially reduced legal immigration into the United States from Mexico. In 1970, it was estimated that approximately 70,000 people commute from Mexico to the United States every day for work, where these workers made up a significant proportion of the labor force in nine main border cities. A 1992 study by San Diego Dialogue, a research institute at the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...

, estimated that there are 40,000 commuter workers in the

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

area. Studies have found that cross-border workers are typically older, less well paid and less well-educated than immigrant workers. Commuting also occurs across the

. In 2020 it was estimated that 1,500 to 2,000 workers in health care in the

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

area lived across the border in

Windsor, Ontario Windsor is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, on the south bank of the Detroit River directly across from Detroit, Michigan, United States. Geographically located within but administratively independent of Essex County, it is the souther ...

. "Canadians are increasingly important to our operations," said the human resources head of Southeast Michigan's largest health care system,

Beaumont Health Beaumont Health is Southeast Michigan’s largest health care system (based on inpatient admissions and net patient revenue). The organization, headquartered in Southfield, Michigan, has net revenue of $4.7 billion and consists of eight hospita ...

Asia

Malaysia and Singapore

More than 300,000

Malaysians Malaysians are nationals and citizens who are identified with the country of Malaysia. Although citizens make up the majority of Malaysians, non-citizen residents and overseas Malaysians may also claim a Malaysian identity. The country is h ...

commute to

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

daily via the

Malaysia–Singapore border The Malaysia–Singapore border is an international maritime border between the Southeast Asian countries of Malaysia, which lies to the north of the border, and Singapore to the south. The boundary is formed by straight lines between maritime g ...

, including for education and work. Many would move to Singapore permanently and take up

Singaporean Singaporeans, or the Singaporean people, refers to citizens or people who identify with the sovereign island city-state of Singapore. Singapore is a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-lingual country. Singaporeans of Chinese, Malay, India ...

citizenship, therefore becoming "Singaporeanised". Other reasons include the country's proximity to Malaysia, its higher standard of living, significantly more job opportunities arising from the country's international status as an economic hub, and most notably the higher currency exchange rate of the

Singapore dollar The Singapore dollar (sign: S$; code: SGD) is the official currency of the Republic of Singapore. It is divided into 100 cents. It is normally abbreviated with the dollar sign $, or S$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currenci ...

over the

Malaysian ringgit The Malaysian ringgit (; plural: ringgit; symbol: RM; currency code: MYR; Malay name: ''Ringgit Malaysia''; formerly the Malaysian dollar) is the currency of Malaysia. It is divided into 100 ''sen'' (formerly ''cents''). The ringgit is issue ...

– S$1 equals to about RM3.10 as of 2022. Analysts has stated that this has caused significant rates of

human capital flight Human capital flight is the emigration or immigration of individuals who have received advanced training at home. The net benefits of human capital flight for the receiving country are sometimes referred to as a "brain gain" whereas the net cost ...

or brain drain from

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

. Major pull factors have included better career opportunities in Singapore and abroad as well as compensation, while major push factors included corruption, social inequality, educational opportunities, racial inequality such as the Malaysian government's ''

bumiputera Bumiputera or Bumiputra, which is a Malay word, comes from the Sanskrit word ''Bhumiputra'' which may be transliterated as "son of earth" or "son of the soil" (Bhūmi; भूमि = earth; putra = son). It has different definitions in Brunei and Ma ...

'' affirmative action policies. A

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) is part of the United Nations Secretariat and is responsible for the follow-up to major United Nations Summits and Conferences, as well as services to the United Nations Econ ...

showed that close to a million Malaysians were in Singapore as of 2019. Human capital flight from Malaysia has also increased in pace – 305,000 Malaysians migrated overseas between March 2008 and August 2009, compared to 140,000 in 2007. Non-bumiputeras, particularly

Malaysian Indian Malaysian Indians or Indian Malaysians are Malaysian citizens of Indian or South Asian ancestry. Today, they form the third-largest group in Malaysia after the Malays and the Chinese. Most are descendants of those who migrated from India durin ...

s and

Malaysian Chinese Malaysian Chinese (; Malay: ''Orang Cina Malaysia''), alternatively Chinese Malaysians, are Malaysian citizens of Han Chinese descent. They form the second largest ethnic group after the Malay majority constituting 22.4% of the Malaysian po ...

, were over-represented in these statistics.

is the foremost destination. This is reported to have caused Malaysia's economic growth rate to fall to an average of 4.6% per annum in the 2000s compared to 7.2% in the 1990s.

Legal status

United States

The majority of United States cross-border commuters have permanent resident status in the United States (a 'green card') but are permitted to reside in Mexico or Canada without losing their permanent residency if they continue to regularly commute to the United States. Skilled Canadian workers in executive or managerial roles are eligible under the

North American Free Trade Agreement The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA ; es, Tratado de Libre Comercio de América del Norte, TLCAN; french: Accord de libre-échange nord-américain, ALÉNA) was an agreement signed by Canada, Mexico, and the United States that crea ...

for a temporary L-1 immigration status, that permits them to commute to jobs in the United States. Until 2019, individual workers could apply to Customs and Border Protection at a point of entry. Since early 2019

Department of Homeland Security The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. Its stated missions involve anti-terr ...

, regulations require employers to file L-1 applications and extensions with the

United States Citizenship and Immigration Service U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that administers the country's naturalization and immigration system. It is a successor to the Immigration and Naturaliza ...

Europe

In Europe, cross-border commuting within the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

, by citizens of an EU country, requires no additional legal status due to the

free movement of labour The freedom of movement for workers is a policy chapter of the Acquis, acquis communautaire of the European Union. The free movement of workers means that nationals of any member state of the European Union can take up an employment in another mem ...

within the EU.

References

Sources

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Commuter worker Immigration to the United States Immigration to Singapore