Refugees today stand at the uneasy intersection of desperation and economic necessity – indispensable to the functioning of global markets yet treated as disposable in both policy and practice. In every corner of the world, from the garment factories of Turkey to the domestic work sectors of Poland, from demolition sites in Japan to informal markets in Bangladesh, refugees have become structural components of national labor systems. They are absorbed into the global economy not as rights-bearing workers, but as a reserve army of low-cost laborer whose vulnerability ensures their compliance.

This growing dependency between refugees and markets is not the result of benevolent inclusion, but of a systemic failure to uphold the promise of protection. Host governments continue to resist granting refugees full work rights, while major donor countries are slashing humanitarian aid budgets. The closure of USAID in the United States is an emblem of this retrenchment, representing not just a bureaucratic shift but a profound rupture in the global humanitarian architecture. As traditional aid dries up, refugees are left with little choice: either find informal, precarious work or face destitution.

Across continents, the patterns are disturbingly similar. Refugees’ integration into labor markets is selective and uneven – shaped by arbitrary distinctions between “deserving” and “undeserving” populations. States are increasingly allowing limited groups of refugees to access certain jobs, often framed as a humanitarian gesture or a step toward “self-reliance.” Yet these legal reforms rarely translate into meaningful economic participation.

In Poland, Colombia, and Jordan, for example, formal access to labor markets exists on paper but is undermined by bureaucratic red tape, anti-refugee sentiment, and austerity-driven cuts to development programs. Even when refugees are allowed to work legally, they remain confined to the lowest rungs of the economic ladder. In Colombia, millions of Venezuelan refugees with professional skills remain trapped in informal sectors despite the government’s progressive policies. In Poland, Ukrainian refugees granted swift work authorization under a “special law”........

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