An Undocumented Economy: Side Hustles, Gigs, Swap Meets, and Migration in the Imperial-Mexicali Valley, 1917-2000

This study observes how residents and unauthorized immigrants reacted innovatively alongside the undocumented economy due to the rigid immigration and economic legal systems between the United States and Mexico, especially the former. I examine such economic processes in California’s rural Imperial County and Baja California’s urban Mexicali between 1917 and 2000. During this period, both nation-states created immigration laws that influenced the region’s demographic makeup, transforming the area from a multiracial and multiethnic community into a predominantly ethnic-Mexican borderland. Despite ethnic Mexicans comprising most of the population in the Imperial-Mexicali Valley, restrictive immigration laws and discriminatory preconceptions pushed them into low-paying jobs in the agricultural, service, and retail sectors. Furthermore, lower annual immigration quotas in the late 1960s meant that many Mexican citizens had to pay for services and goods in that country in cash as unauthorized immigrants. Thus, residents and immigrants persevered by engaging in pioneering undocumented sub-economies. They formed swap meets and worked as informal street vendors, taxi drivers, housekeepers, and other occupations to alleviate their economic condition, expanding the borderland economy