Increased Risks, Financial Pressures and Benefit Ineligibility: Nicole Hallett Discusses Salon Workers' Plight Returning to Work in Pandemic

University of Chicago Law Professor Nicole Hallett ('10), Director of the Law School's Immigrants' Rights Clinic who has also represented salon workers, was quoted in a Vox article discussing the risks nail technicians face in returning to jobs they can't afford to lose ("'Putting Their Life on the Line Doing Your Nails': What Salon Workers Face in the Pandemic," May 20). "There's really no way for you to socially distance and get a manicure." According to a UCLA/California Healthy Nail Salon Collaborative report cited in the article, a majority of nail salon workers are immigrants, many undocumented, whose ineligibility for benefits and lack of other protections further compel them: "[Workers] may feel pressure to go back to work not only because their employer might be pressuring them. They're trying to put food on the table."
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