Since the 1970s Mexico's northern frontier has undergone enormous changes. The border area draws people in because it has become one of the country's main industrial centres. It is a dynamic picture of production. A 1996 survey showed 719 maquiladoras in 25 industrial parks. This is helped by the corporatism of the official Mexican trade unions, whose executives enforce a customer-oriented management to ensure good relations in the workplace.
Labour flexibility is greater here than in the rest of the country.
Usually, union activities are absent from the workshops, and the existence of collective agreements is ignored. Protests by workers are ruthlessly suppressed, and lead to mass sackings and the closing of factories that are then transferred to more cooperative areas. The capital resources and sheer size of the American market are determining the Mexican economy, which is becoming more and more dependent on the dollar. Yet the abundance of cheap labour is not a comparative advantage matching the inflow of capital, technology and buying power of the great American market. Claiming that this is reciprocal benefit and a rewarding interdependence is pure myth.