Modern Day Slavery

IS THE ACQUISITION OF PEOPLE USING FORCE, DECEPTION, OR COERCION WITH THE INTENT TO EXPLOIT

Men, women, and children are sold into a $150 billion annual market for sex and labor. This is happening globally, and domestically; in urban and suburban areas; in hotels, restaurants, and on street corners. Slavery is wrapped up in almost every industry’s supply chain, tainting the food we eat, the clothes we buy, and the electronics we love. After the international drug trade, trafficking of humans is tied with arms dealing as the second- largest criminal industry in the world. Human trafficking is the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.

Labor Trafficking & Debt Bondage

ARE THE MOST COMMON FORMS OF TRAFFICKING TODAY

Sex trafficking is often highlighted in the media but is not the primary form of modern-day slavery. Using coercion, violence and deception, labor traffickers force victims to work against their will in industries that range from small mom-and-pop shops to enormous mineral extraction camps for commodities such as gold. Some individuals enter into work agreements willingly but accrue enormous debt to the trafficker in the form of food, shelter, documentation, and travel fees. The traffickers inflate these costs and tack on enormous interest rates that condemn their new hires to a life of underpaid labor or slavery.

Sex Trafficking

GENERATES $99 BILLION IN ILLEGAL PROFITS

Victims of sex trafficking are forced to work in the commercial sex trade against their will. Physical and emotional violence is an intrinsic part of this industry, which preys on individuals in conditions of physical, economic, and psychological vulnerability. To keep them working, victims are threatened, lied to, and beaten by traffickers and pimps, who control their money. This practice exists within all sectors of the sex industry, including street prostitution, strip clubs, residential brothels, pornography stores and massage parlors.