COLUMN ONE : Domestics: Hiring the Illegal Hits Home : The thriving market for low-cost child care and menial help shows how ignoring immigration law has entrenched itself in California life.

It doesn’t matter that Margarita is an illegal immigrant, speaks no English and has neither a driver’s license nor a car. In Los Angeles, she has no problem finding work, even with the bad economy.

She is one of the army of undocumented domestics in California, doing such essential tasks as caring for children, cooking and cleaning. Willing to work more than 50 hours a week for about $130, she has found parents eager to hire her, regardless of her status.

And even though Margarita says she misses her children and grandchildren back in Mexicali, she stays here because “they all depend on me” to send money.

Margarita’s story reflects the economic forces that have converged to make domestic work a magnet for undocumented immigrant women in California. It also tells why, experts say, these women will continue to do these jobs even if voters approve Proposition 187, a measure intended to crack down on illegal immigrants by denying them public services.

Domestic work is just one of several fields employing thousands of undocumented workers in California.

But nothing rivals domestic jobs in showing how the personal lives of U.S. citizens have become intertwined with, and often dependent on, people employed here illegally. As such, it reflects the clash between the gut feelings many voters have about illegal immigration and what is being practiced in thousands of California homes.

That conflict made headlines this week when Senate candidate Mike Huffington, a strong supporter of Proposition 187, acknowledged that for five years he employed a woman living in this country illegally to care for his children.

Likewise, for all of the anger reflected in opinion polls about illegal immigration, American families still want illegal nannies and housekeepers who will work hard for long hours and meager pay--often for less than the minimum wage. It is one of the stubborn contradictions of the immigration debate sweeping the state.

“It’s hard to believe people will give up their domestics no matter what law they pass,” said Julia Wrigley, a sociologist who has studied domestics and their employers. In Southern California, she said, “there are lifestyles . . . that depend on there being cheap labor available.”

“I realize it’s not legal or the all-American thing to do,” said a Woodland Hills woman who employs an illegal immigrant from Mexico to watch her two young sons at home. But, she said, given the lack of child care options and the fact that she and her husband work outside the home, “What’s our alternative?”

That is an argument made by many families, particularly those with modest incomes or headed by a single parent.

There also is a mean edge behind some of the hiring. Operators of employment agencies that place domestics say there is no shortage of legal residents willing to do the work; but these workers normally won’t put in difficult 12-hour days for less than they could earn at a fast-food restaurant. Rather than accept that fact and pay more, many families--even in wealthy neighborhoods--offer wages that only illegal immigrants will accept.

Eva Meszaros, owner of Eva’s Domestic Agency in Van Nuys, said her firm routinely turns down requests from would-be customers who demand: “Give me one of your starving girls who are willing to work for $100 a week.”

The undocumented domestics, for their part, often have few job skills or prospects in their native countries.

“If you compare the opportunities in the United States and the opportunities in their home countries, the U.S. is still going to be a better deal,” even if Proposition 187 passes, said Deborah Cobb-Clark, an Illinois State University economist who has studied employment of Latina immigrants.

The statistics on illegal domestics, a diverse group including Salvadoran housecleaners and English nannies, are imprecise. As with other figures on undocumented immigrants, experts say, they should be used cautiously. But a 1989 survey of illegal immigrants who applied for legal residency under an amnesty program provides a sense of the numbers.

Based on the survey, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service estimated that more than 41,000 illegal immigrants in California who applied for amnesty were working as private household employees in the late 1980s. That sum was almost half of all undocumented domestics in the contiguous 48 states. It also suggests that of the 133,576 domestics counted in California in the 1990 census, nearly one in three was illegal.

Further estimates show that the overwhelming majority of the undocumented domestics came from three countries: Mexico, El Salvador and Guatemala.

Although the amnesty program legalized many workers, the ranks of illegal domestics have been replenished. For newly arrived undocumented women, experts say, domestic work is the leading type of employment.

In the most-demanding domestic jobs--such as round-the-clock assistance to the disabled and the elderly--undocumented workers are particularly prevalent.

Carl Shusterman, a Los Angeles immigration lawyer, said he knows of families in fancy neighborhoods who also hire illegal immigrants, not to save money but because “these illegals are people they can trust and have personal qualities they haven’t found in American workers.”

Last year, President Clinton’s first nominee for attorney general, Zoe Baird, withdrew after disclosing that she and her husband had hired undocumented household help.

What prods many families to hire undocumented domestics, particularly poorly educated immigrants from Third World countries, is their desire to exert control over people living and working in their homes. As Wrigley points out in her upcoming book, “Other People’s Children,” parents would like “care-givers who share their child-rearing values and who operate independently, but they also want inexpensive, reliable, controllable employees.”

Many employers hesitate to ask better-educated employees who are U.S.-born or legal residents to do menial tasks, such as cleaning up after the family dog. “There’s a sense that these people won’t stay on the job if they are asked to do things distasteful,” Wrigley said.

Why do illegal domestics keep coming? Margarita, 43, said she arrived three years ago when she no longer could find factory jobs in Mexicali. She says employers there “only want young people.”

Work as a housekeeper in this country has been easy to find, albeit at wages that amount to less than the $4.25-an-hour legal minimum. Margarita has worked for three families, earning from $520 to $540 a month.

Margarita said her husband, who stayed with their children in Mexicali, earns little. He has a bad leg and can work only intermittently as a street vendor. Margarita saves about $200 to $300 a month, which she sends to her family. “I stay (in the United States) for my children,” said Margarita, who lives in a room she rents from a family in the San Fernando Valley.

The situation is similar for Guadalupe, a native of Mexico City who, like Margarita, asked that her last name not be used.

Guadalupe, who is single and 36, said she sends up to $200 a month to her mother and three younger siblings. At home, she said, there were times “when we had to decide between buying shoes or clothes” for her brothers and sisters.

Although Guadalupe said she was trained as a computer programmer, jobs were sporadic. “You can’t save money that way,” she said. “I thought I could come here and save money.”

As for the impact of Proposition 187, many domestics apparently would not miss the public services the initiative would deny them.

Although Proposition 187 would bar public education for illegal immigrants, many domestics have no children in this country. The workday often is too long to accommodate family responsibilities; immigrant women who have families and who speak little English often work in garment shops.

In addition, even though domestics might miss publicly funded health care services that would be banned by the proposition, “they’re not necessarily going to have health care back home either,” said Cobb-Clark, the economist.

The main option for government officials who want to stop illegal hiring--a stepped-up crackdown on rogue employers--is not likely to have much impact on domestics. Occasionally the INS responds to tips, but the agency does not have enough investigators to go door to door in residential neighborhoods.

“You’re dealing with limited resources,” said John Brechtel, the INS investigations chief for the district extending from Orange to San Luis Obispo counties.

Consequently, although some families require their domestics to have Social Security cards or other proof of legal residency, many others ignore the issue.

There is “no hint of a preference” among most employers whether their domestics are legal or not, said Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, a USC sociologist researching families who hire housecleaners. “For most employers, it’s not convenient to broach the topic.”

What is more important for many families is getting an employee at a good price.

The going rate for legal live-in housekeepers in Southern California begins at about $125 a week, according to employment agencies. It rises to more than $500 weekly for those with good references and many years of experience, particularly if they are from Europe.

Full-time “live-outs” commonly earn an extra $20 to $50 a week, in lieu of room and board.

Yet for live-ins who neither speak English nor drive, particularly illegals, the pay can sink below $100 a week.

Critics blame the abuse on racism. Domestics often “feel like they’re treated like chattel, and not like human beings,” said Nancy Cervantes, a lawyer with the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles.

She and others familiar with the problems of undocumented domestics also say they were surprised at how so many parents are willing to put their children in the hands of people they pay so poorly.

Even among well-intentioned employers, there is “such a big supply (of available domestics), people think, ‘Why should I pay more?’ ” Wrigley said.

For the families who hire undocumented domestics, life without them is nearly impossible or, at least, unpleasant to imagine. Working parents often lament that they have few other child care options, if they cannot or do not want to handle it themselves.

The Woodland Hills woman who employs an illegal immigrant said she briefly considered putting her boys in day care.

She concluded that it was too expensive and impersonal. “I like the idea of having one-on-one attention given to my child,” she said.

Also, “when a child is sick, some employers don’t understand” that many parents need to stay home, she said.

Hiring a domestic means that her children stay in the cozy confines of their own house. If she needs to stay at work late, or if she and her husband want to go out at night, there is no need to make hasty child care arrangements.

Their housekeeper “is like a member of the family. She pitches in and helps out,” the mother said.

She says she sometimes feels bad about not being able to pay more. She and her husband pay their live-in worker $175 for a five-day week, along with room and board and occasional bonuses. She said they cannot afford to pay the extra $75 or more a week commanded in her area by legal resident housekeepers who drive and speak English fluently.

By her reckoning, what she and her husband do is proper because they compensate their housekeeper well compared to what many other families do, and her housekeeper earns far more than she probably would in Mexico. Likewise, even if employing an undocumented worker is against the law, she does not see what the real damage is. “You’re not going to find any Americans who will do this for, obviously, this kind of pay,” she said.

Some employers say they would think twice about hiring an undocumented worker again, given the anti-illegal immigration mood in California. They say a different attitude prevailed when they hired their domestics.

Hiring an undocumented domestic “was the kind of thing that everyone did,” said one married professional woman with three children who hired her housekeeper 10 years ago. The Guatemalan woman, in her early 50s, obtained a legal green card a few years ago.

But back when the mother was looking for a housekeeper, she was mainly concerned about getting one with good references who was, preferably, from a Spanish-speaking country. “I feel that Spanish people are very warm and are wonderful with children,” said the mother, who is white. Many employers prefer hiring members of certain ethnic groups.

Like many in her situation, the mother expresses sympathy for illegal immigrants and says she strongly opposes Proposition 187. “It’s against minorities,” she said.

But immigrant rights advocates worry that if Proposition 187 passes, attitudes will harden. They say working conditions that already are awful for many domestics, particularly live-ins, will worsen.

“The new arrivals can be found in conditions of near-slavery,” Wrigley contended, sharing rooms with the babies they care for instead of getting their own living quarters, and prevented from having independent social lives. Some complain that they are not allowed to step outside for a breath of air; in Spanish, live-in jobs sometimes are described as encerrado, a word also used to mean “locked up.”

Although some employers are close with their domestics, Wrigley said, others “assume their care-givers don’t have the same human needs. . . . It can be a very lonely life.”

Meszaros said domestics have told her of cases where “they were expected to work until 1 or 2 at night, and sometimes have to be ready again at 6 in the morning.” There also are reports of employers who sexually abuse domestics.

Many undocumented domestics prefer jobs as housecleaners, working for a variety of employers instead of a single boss.

But in doing research on people who hire housecleaners, USC’s Hondagneu-Sotelo has found everything from an employer who claims to have gone years without even learning her domestic’s last name to a family who sponsored their domestic and her children for U.S. citizenship.

If they cannot make a go of it as housecleaners, many illegal domestics opt for full-time jobs as “live-out” housekeepers.

Guadalupe switched to live-out jobs after working as a live-in housekeeper for a couple who were doctors. “They wanted to see me active all day,” she said.

Once when she sat down to relax before preparing dinner and putting the couple’s twin infants to bed, the mother “looked at me and said, ‘You know what, why don’t you go outside and wash the cars?’ ”

Guadalupe eventually quit that job, and now she baby-sits during the day for a family that she says treats her well.

Also, she is taking English classes in hopes that it will improve her job prospects when she returns to Mexico someday. She worries that the anti-immigrant sentiment she believes is behind Proposition 187 could make her life more difficult, and possibly force her and other undocumented immigrants taking classes at public schools to drop their studies.

Still, reflecting the thinking of many undocumented domestics, Guadalupe is not concerned enough to seriously consider leaving the United States anytime soon, regardless of what happens with the proposition. She needs to earn more money to help her widowed mother put the family’s three youngest children through college and high school in Mexico.

It is a matter of economics, Guadalupe explained, and America still is the land of economic opportunity--even for an illegal immigrant.

Times staff writer Kevin Baxter contributed to this story.

Immigrant Domestic Workers

Most domestic workers in California--including nannies, cleaners, housekeepers and others who work in private homes--are immigrants. According to the 1990 U.S. census, immigrants accounted for more than 58% of the state’s domestics, with the figure rising to 80% in Los Angeles County and nearly 69% in Orange County.

Here is where California’s immigrant domestic workers, both documented and undocumented, come from:

% OF CALIFORNIA PLACE OF ORIGIN IMMIGRANT DOMESTICS Mexico 33.0% El Salvador 28.7% Guatemala 17.4% Asia 5.0% Honduras 3.5% South America 3.1% Europe 2.0% Other 7.3%

Source: Computer analysis of 1990 U.S. census data by Times data analyst Sandra Poindexter