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There鈥檚 an ugly truth about what powers the United States economy, says . Our economic system depends on exploited labor and forced work that often meets the definition of human trafficking, asserts the sociologist and consultant on sex work, migration, and trafficking. In her new book, , Ditmore shows how people are 鈥渂eing trafficked into major sectors across the American economy: agriculture, manufacturing, sales, the sex trades, and domestic work.鈥�

Stronger labor laws protecting workers could effectively tackle this exploitation, says Ditmore. But she finds that most lawmakers seem satisfied with lip service around ending human trafficking, while the policies they support maintain the status quo.

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The issue of human trafficking began entering mainstream discourse just over a decade ago. In 2011, Barack Obama became the first U.S. president to . President Joe Biden has , publishing a recent proclamation that contends 鈥渁gencies across the Federal Government are working to combat human trafficking.鈥�

But Ditmore argues that this public focus is often too limited in scope, since 鈥渕ost coverage of human trafficking focuses on the sex industry and sexual servitude, or sex trafficking.鈥�

鈥淭here was nothing looking at forced labor, uncompensated labor, forms of human trafficking through American history,鈥� she says. 鈥淚 wanted to fill that gap.鈥� So she wrote Unbroken Chains.

In her book, Ditmore, who has worked as a consultant on trafficking for the United Nations, makes a direct link between historical forms of human trafficking鈥攕uch as chattel slavery and forced Chinese contract labor鈥攁nd contemporary forms of trafficked labor that presidents and pundits focus on today. She says the form of exploitation most prevalent in the present day is 鈥渋ndentured servitude in which people sign on, in some cases, to work to guarantee their future labor.鈥�

But then, 鈥渟ometimes people think they鈥檝e got a good job and a good job offer and then they get somewhere and they realize the conditions are very different,鈥� she explains.

Ditmore finds that domestic and agricultural workers are among the most likely to fall victim to this sort of bait and switch and end up in situations that can be defined as human trafficking. She profiled several trafficking survivors in her book, including , a Filipino domestic worker who accused her employer of abusing her and won a $825,000 settlement.

Women like Ruiz, especially from the Global South, often arrive in the U.S. for domestic work with a well-defined job description in mind. But then, Ditmore says, they find that 鈥渢heir jobs expanded to include every waking moment,鈥� and sometimes beyond, with employers demanding that workers perform job duties in the middle of the night, or far outside agreed-upon working hours.

But modern human trafficking is not limited to women. Ditmore points to the example of brought in to clean up the damage from Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf Coast region. Those workers, predominantly South Asian men, were highly educated and skilled. 鈥淭hey were kept in segregated camps, segregated by national origin,鈥� says Ditmore. 鈥淭hey were not fed enough, they were expected to work very long days in dangerous conditions without the protective gear.鈥� Additionally, in 2005 allowed the private corporations hiring these workers to pay less than the average local wages. So in 2007, the workers , to call attention to their exploitation鈥攐nly to find that the local trafficking task force 鈥渨as concerned that they had not met the definition of trafficking,鈥� as Ditmore describes.

Ditmore suggests that current political attention on human trafficking is performative rather than practical. In Unbroken Chains, she returns repeatedly to the fact that federal legislation specific to human trafficking has not actually helped victims of human trafficking. 鈥淲e had laws against every aspect of trafficking before the Trafficking Victims Protection Act was passed in 2000,鈥� she says. 鈥淭here are laws against kidnapping. There are labor laws. There are laws against harming people. There are laws against threatening people.鈥�

What is inadequate are the labor laws and regulations protecting people in agricultural and domestic work specifically, Ditmore says. Political will to change those labor laws also appears to be inadequate, as Ditmore discovered when she was working as part of a team advocating to strengthen such laws in Washington, D.C. When she met with legislators鈥� aides, she says she realized lawmakers were 鈥渘ot actually going to back anything to promote workers鈥� rights. But they were very eager to get their names on a bill about sex trafficking.鈥�

鈥淚 found it very frustrating, but also a very good education,鈥� says Ditmore. It was a reminder that 鈥渢he exploitation of labor, and trying to get more than you have paid for 鈥� has always been part of business in the United States.鈥�

Ditmore thinks a stronger labor movement can best address the trafficked labor on which the U.S. economy relies. She is encouraged by the growing strength and prevalence of worker-led unions in recent years. 鈥淭he in Florida does a great job with agricultural workers, and they鈥檙e expanding around the country,鈥� says Ditmore.

Ultimately, Ditmore believes 鈥渁 stronger labor movement in the United States would lead to less exploitation overall鈥攊ncluding less of the worst situations that we see, which meet the definition of trafficking.鈥�