Human Trafficking Analysis of United States and the World Multiple Chapters

Human Trafficking:

Comparative Analysis of Human Trafficking in the United States with the World

Stephanie I.

Specialized Field Project

Human Trafficking is a very serious issue that affects every country around the world. Human Trafficking is also known as "Sex Trafficking," or "Modern Day Slavery," which reflects the primary reasons people are bought and sold today -- sex trade and involuntary labor. The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) defines sex trafficking as

"the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for a commercial sex act, is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such act has not attained 18 years of age."

Moreover, labor trafficking is defined as

"the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, using force, fraud, or coercion for subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage or slavery." (CNHTR, n.d.)

Victims of trafficking include men, women and children. However, women and children make up of eighty percent of the trafficked victims that come across U.S. borders and seventy percent of them are trafficked into the prostitution and pornography industry. (CNHTR, n.d.). Victims are mainly used for household labor, agriculture, food and care services, and in the garment industry. "Traffickers use force, fraud and coercion to compel women, men and children to engage in these activities." (CNHTR, n.d.).

Typically, human trafficking has become a global issue because every country is affected. Comparative analysis of the human trafficking in the United States with the rest of the world reveals there has been a yearly increase in human trafficking in the U.S. and at a global level. For example, U.S. Department of Justice estimates that between 14,500 and 17,500 people are trafficked into the United States yearly, and category of trafficked people are women, children, teenagers, and young children, which can be foreign national or domestic citizens. Under the federal law, it is a crime to force people working by force. However, enforcement of this law was challenging because human trafficking still rose by 35.7% in the United States between 2015 and 2016. Since 2008, there have been 2,515 cases of reported human trafficking and half of the cases are children under age of 18. The data reveal that 82% of the cases are sex trafficking, and 83% of victims are American citizens. (U.S. Department of Justice, 2011). Moreover 10% of the cases are labor trafficking consist of 81% male and 29% females.

Moreover, between 2015 and 2016, there were 7,572 reported cases that involved 6,340 females and 978 males. There are also cases of 70 listed gender minority. However, reported cases showed that 4,890 were adults as well as 2,387 minors, and there were also issues of non-reported cases of human trafficking. California is number one state in the United States with 1,323 cases. This is followed by Texas with 670 cases and Florida with 550 cases. However, Alaska, Rhode Island and Vermont have the fewest cases of human trafficking. (Banks, & Kyckelhahn, 2011). Despite the effort of the federal and state governments to arrest the problems, the cases of human trafficking continue to rise in the United States. (Banks, & Kyckelhahn, 2011).

Similarly, the human trafficking continues to increase with no sign of reducing at a global level. Similar to the case of the United States, sexual form of human tracking is the worst form of global human trafficking with 79% of the case, and forced labor accounts for the 18% of the case. Globally, sexual molestation is the most documented form of human trafficking compared with forced labor, forced marriage, domestic servitude, organ removal, sex trade and exploit children for begging. (UNODC (2009). Evidently, traffickers exploit the disadvantaged people and prey on their lack of security, deceive them, gain their control and profit from their forced services.

Evidence from the UN report shows that women are the highest penetrators of human trafficking. For example, thousands of girls from West African countries have been trafficked to Europe and lured them into a prostitution. While the United States has more stringent law that other countries against human trafficking, yet, human trafficking is still on the rise in the United States and at the global level. Similar to the United States, an increasing number of countries are making efforts to track down the human traffickers. For example,

countries in central Asia and Eastern Europe record largest number of convictions with more than 10 recorded conviction per year. Followed by countries in the Central Europe and Eastern Europe with 10 recorded conviction per year. According to data presented by the United Nations, United States also has a record of up to 10 conviction per year. It is only the South Africa that has no record of the conviction of human traffickers.

Similar to other countries across the globe, United States is the source destination and transit for children, men and women used for trafficking. Moreover, there has been a recorded issue of sex trafficking of both U.S. citizens and foreign nationals. In the United States, trafficking occurs both in illicit and legal industries that include commercial sex, manufacturing, salon services, restaurants, carnivals and domestic services. People who enter the United States without legal status have been the victims of trafficking making the NGO (Non-Governmental Organization), governments and organizations to express a concern about the risks associated with the global supply chain of human trafficking. The NGOs have noted that traffickers target disabled people and lured children into prostitutions. Typically, victims originate from all states in the United States, and all countries across the globe are the victim of human trafficking. While the victims originate from all countries in the world, however, the United Unites, Philippines, and Mexico have been the top three countries that are sources of human trafficking victims in 2015 fiscal year.

Women are frequently victims of sex trafficking because of traditional gender roles. Families in countries such as India, Nepal and West Africa choose to educate their male children and send their daughters to work at an early age (Buchmann, DiPrete, & McDaniel, 2008). In Asia, women and children are the ideal victims for human trafficking because their cultures believe that they should carry the burden of family hardships and responsibilities.

Human trafficking is considered by the United Nations to be one of the fastest growing trans-national crimes, along with drug trafficking and the sale of illicit arms. Human trafficking violates immigration policies, labor laws, human rights regulations and above all, human dignity. Trafficking in persons is a low-risk enterprise since the number of investigations and prosecutions is relatively low; however, the illicit trade is highly profitable with annual revenues topping US $31.6 billion in 2005 (Belser, 2005, UN. GIFT). The probability of bringing traffickers to justice is minimal. In 2006, according to the United Nations "for every 800-people trafficked, only one person was convicted," (p 1) making human trafficking an effective and attractive business.

Based on 2007 data gathered by the ILO, the United Nations estimates that 2.5 million people find themselves victims of forced labor (including sexual exploitation) as a result of trafficking: 56% are in Asia and the Pacific, 10% are in Latin America and the Caribbean, 9.2% are in the Middle East and Northern Africa, 5.2% are in sub-Saharan countries, 10.8% are in industrialized countries and 8% are in countries in transition.

In other continents such as Latin America, Europe and Asia, women are offered opportunities to work and live in the United States. Instead, they are deceived into signing contracts with trafficking recruiters stating that they would work to pay back smuggling fees. This so-called "debt bondage" agreement (Broderick, 2005) ensures that, most often, trafficked women spend the rest of their lives being sexually exploited and living in enslaved conditions. (Broderick, 2005). They are never compensated, instead they are physically and psychologically manipulated and tortured. Once victims of human trafficking are enslaved, it is almost impossible for them to escape. It has been difficult to quantify the exact extent of trafficking, not only because of the concealed nature of the crime, but also because, until several years ago, there had been little agreement on the definition of human trafficking.

Traffickers use countless methods of control their victims. Some of those methods include debt bondage, little or no medical attention, malnourishment, long hours of slavery and little or no compensation, in addition to physical and psychological abuse and/or trauma amongst many other things. Overall, the victims of human trafficking are faced with endless possibilities of how they will be hurt. The truth is unless the trafficker is caught by the authorities or the victim dies, victims tend to experience a lot of mental, physical and emotional pain.

Many countries have tried to combat human trafficking by implementing different policies. In the U.S. sex trafficking is one of the most profitable criminal activities, as traffickers make anywhere from thirteen to twenty billion worldwide per year. New policies such as the "Trafficking Victims Protection act of 2000 and the…