Plunging Into Precarious Work : Neoliberalism, Immigrant Labour and the Case of Bathroom Attendants in Toronto, the "Global City"

This paper builds on Canadian research documenting immigrants' overrepresentation in 'precarious work', and the manifestations of poor working conditions in their daily lives. To do so the paper presents a two-fold analysis. The first section critically analyzes how the 'global city' and neoliberal restructuring reinforce structural and ideological barriers limiting immigrants from decent work and pushing them to precarious work. The second section introduces the case study of bathroom attendants working in Toronto's nightclubs. It contributes to the literature by documenting the organization of work and analyzing how the indicators of precarity pertain because of their location in the informal sector and the nightclub industry, in addition to their work arrangements and social location as immigrants. It concludes by documenting tactics of resistance deployed by these workers to contest their social powerlessness.