The so-called “Texas Miracle” refers to construction booms in such major cities as Dallas and Austin, where buildings shoot up at a fast clip through a combination of deregulation and employing a workforce that is at least 50% undocumented and vulnerable immigrants. Setting aside the outrageous hypocrisy of American xenophobia condemning undocumented immigrants while the U.S. desperately needs their low-paid labor to spur economic growth, the real lesson of the Texas Miracle, as we learn from this long-in-the-making documentary by Chelsea Hernandez, is that “deregulation” where workers are concerned, is code for thievery, cruelty, and corruption.
The film gives us both the big picture and anecdotal evidence of industry and government collusion in shortcutting worker protections in the Texas construction industry. We learn that a construction worker dies every 2.5 days in the Lone Star state. Laborers often go without respite under a hot sun and with no breaks. (Part of the story here concerns an astonishing fight by anti-regulation members of the Dallas city council to block a proposed ordinance mandating a ten-minute break every four hours.) Wage theft is rampant.
Fighting back against these problems, with mixed success, is the Workers Defense Project, an advocacy group for immigrant workers that get involved in specific cases, such as that of Claudia, an electrician from El Salvador who is ripped off, along with her co-worker/husband, to the tune of $11,000 by an employer. (When the latter told them to meet him at his office to collect their pay, he called the cops on them.)
The film is heartening in that it shows us how some people will fight back, including at least a few of the undocumented, who have reason to worry about speaking up. At the same time, we know that every ounce of progress made toward laborer protections is far outweighed by the unscrupulous. Building the American Dream will make a viewer angry, but let in a little daylight, too. Strongly recommended. J, H, C, P (T. Keogh)