guest worker

noun

|Updated on: 19 Jun 2018

Definition of guest worker

: a foreign laborer working temporarily in an industrialized usually European country

See guest worker defined for English-language learners

Recent Examples of guest worker from the Web

Immigration hardliners, who want to reduce immigration to the United States, argue access to guest workers drives down wages for domestic labor.

— emily cadei, sacbee, "Trump administration pushes changes to farmworker visa," 15 June 2018
But the administration has increased visas in one area: the H2B visa program, which is used for non-agricultural, seasonal guest workers.

— alan gomez, USA TODAY, "All the ways President Trump is cutting legal immigration," 12 June 2018
Aides said the outline does not include provisions dealing with employer verification of work authorization or a guest worker program for the agricultural sector.

— louis lucero ii, BostonGlobe.com, "Justice Dept. requests delay if DACA injunction is issued," 10 June 2018
The Turkish community is small and long established: The first guest workers arrived in the 1960s and ’70s, like Mr. Bagislayici’s father.

— katrin bennhold, New York Times, "Crosses Go Up in Public Offices. It’s Culture, Bavaria Says, Not Religion.," 30 May 2018
Potomac Watch Podcast Potomac Watch Podcast An increasing number of farmers are thus turning to H-2A visas for guest workers.

— the editorial board, WSJ, "Exporting Jobs Instead of Food," 17 May 2018
Then in the 1960s Turkish guest workers started to arrive, followed in the 1990s by Russian-Germans from the Volga.

— The Economist, "Whose Heimat?A land of multiple identities," 12 Apr. 2018
Those guest workers are a major source of foreign income for Pyongyang, and two of the biggest employers of North Koreans are Security Council members China and Russia.

— amy b wang, Washington Post, "Only two people have met both Trump and Kim Jong Un. One is Dennis Rodman.," 9 Mar. 2018
California growers have been recruiting agricultural guest workers in record numbers amid a prolonged shortage of local labor.

— geoffrey mohan, latimes.com, "Three men charged with scamming agricultural guest workers," 17 May 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'guest worker.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.