A Guest-Worker Program That Does Well by Migrants

If a quarry needs a migrant worker who can haul 50-pound loads of rock out of a mine, or a big landscaper wants to hire a man who'll mow grass from sunup to sundown for $8 an hour without overstaying his visa, Jeffrey West scrolls through his computer, clicks the mouse and fills the order.

West, an American who lives in Texas and runs an office here, provides a legal passageway to the United States for several thousand temporary Mexican workers every year, signing them up, helping them get visas, putting them in a database for companies in the north to peruse. Though the pay is low and the work grueling, he hardly has to go looking for willing workers.
 
"They find us," said West, 45, a matter-of-fact Midwesterner. "We don't have to go out and recruit."

West's secure database -- MexicanLabor.com -- contains photos and profiles of more than 20,000 Mexican men and a few women.

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