Circular Migration of Live-ins in Germany
additionally to the restrictive rights , the circularity of live-ins also prevents this acclimatization to local hierarchies from happening , keeping them from claiming their rights and improving their situation .
In her conclusion , Schilliger ( 2013 ) explains that there is a deregulated market developing , “ a precarious , gendered and ethnitized labour market ” ( 2013 , 156 ). Schilliger ’ s ( 2013 ) results also show that only because of the circularity this sort of work can be done by the live-ins because after 3 month they are exhausted by the hard work and they recover again in their home countries . Another aspect Schilliger ( 2013 ) points to is the description of the work and that even though some of the live-ins are highly qualified , what is asked of them are traditionally female tasks . This way of framing the work could also be seen in the results of this study . Even though some of the live-ins had higher qualifications , those did not matter in this situation as they were mainly doing domestic tasks . Informants pointed out , that these domestic tasks do not only “ come naturally ” to the live-ins because they are mainly women , but also because they are Eastern European women , who are “ less emancipated ” than German women . This sort of framing should be paid particular attention to because employers , especially the agencies in Germany , can strategically frame the work in this way to avoid seeing it like “ real ” work , which should follow the basic laws any other work applies to . While the subsector of live-ins is based on migration , in elderly homes and outpatient care migration only plays a marginal role . Recruiting nurses has proven to be risky and not as effective , partly also due to unattractive working conditions . While in one of the interviews , live-in arrangements have been portrayed as a temporary phenomenon and as no alternative to professional care , there is an undeniable gap in services . The emancipation in Germany and changes in traditional family structures increase the shortage of labor in this sector . While the shortage of labor in elderly care homes and outpatient care will most likely not be covered by the recruitment of nurses from abroad , the gap in “ in-house care ” giving rise to the subsector of live-ins will likely remain or even grow in size .
Even though it is not called circular migration this analysis has shown that the profession is built on the circular movements of the live-ins . Interestingly enough , at first glance the circularity of live-ins fits well into the definitions of circular migration as “ spontaneous ” and unregulated movement . This points to a dichotomy in the definitions between state run “ programs ” and the spontaneous circular migration . The circularity in the case of live-ins , however , has been proven as not fitting in either of the two definitions . Even though it might not seem like managed circular migration at first sight , because the “ managers ” of the movement are no state officials , the placement of live-ins is a highly managed process . The possibility of liveins to influence their situation themselves is still limited as they depend on the agencies abroad . The first reason for this dependency is that as a precondition for the freedom to provide services to apply , the live-ins have to be employed by an agency in the sending countries . The second reason for the dependency on the agencies is that they possess the
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