Migration and migrant regulation have been among the most divisive phenomena of the past 150 years, with migration characterizing the intensifying of economic globalization even as the naturalization of nation-states fostered ideologies and structures for border control and management of mobility. Such conflicts and contradictions gain visibility when explored through global and comparative perspectives that reveal universal aspects of migrant imperatives and strategies, the necessity of moving peoples for many political and economic projects, and the emergence and replication of national institutions and ideologies that regulate migrants in inherently discriminatory ways. This paper presents an overview of findings in the 31-chapters of CHGM relevant to labor migrations and their regulation and a selection of the conceptual gambits proposed by contributing authors to improve understanding of these inegalitarian systems and thereby contribute to their reform and improvement.

I analyze the complex web of transnational family ties among Silicon Valley's elite migrants, Southeast Asian care workers ("SE sisters"), and their connections to Taiwanese grandparents. Drawing on two decades of ethnographic fieldwork, I offer a political-economic perspective on the transformation and globalization of social reproductive labor; I illustrate two global labor structures, reflecting diverse labor migration between affluent and less affluent societies, influenced by legal status and financial resources. STEM education in the United States is a "super server" facilitating global opportunities for migrants. This metaphor frames my analysis of educational pathways. Meanwhile, Silicon Valley's allure as a high-tech hub draws skilled professionals from Asia, often requiring them to leave behind family obligations. Their senior parents left behind in their home country need the care. In contrast, Southeast Asian domestic workers from countries like Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, and Nepal fill the familial void left by professional migrants. Unlike their counterparts, SE sisters often have limited naturalization options. I redefine professional migration as transgenerational adjustments within extended families across multiple generations, highlighting emotional ties to home countries. We examine networks and enclaves formed by Indonesian domestic workers connecting Taipei to Jogorogo, Indonesia. This includes changes in family structures, socio-educational platforms, daily transnational interactions, and translocal networks. Lastly, I emphasize the crucial role of family networks as support systems that connect transnational migrants to their cultural roots through communication technologies. I comprehensively explore the intricate dynamics within transnational migration and family bonds. We underscore the importance of understanding this multifaceted social phenomenon's emotional and economic facets.

National migration policies and the stiff global competition among nations over migrants with skills in STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and math) are rooted in both the neoliberal organization of the global economy and the neocolonial underpinnings of the Cold War. My presentation discusses these roots that are crucial for understanding more recent trends in policies aimed at skilled migration. I will begin with the emergence of U.S. immigration policies that offered preferential treatment to workers with skills in STEM fields to strengthen the military-industrial complex following World War II. These policies were soon followed by the Cold War superpowers and their allies' efforts to support the development of science and technology projects in newly decolonizing nations in an effort to gain their allegiance. Meanwhile, in the mid-1960s, i.e., just as these efforts started to bear fruit, major destination countries began to remove their race-based restrictions on immigration. Combined with skills-based visas, this led, at least temporarily, to what is widely referred to as a &'brain drain' from the new nations. By the 1980s, the rise of the Information Age and the global spread of free-market capitalism expanded the market for migrants with skills in STEM fields, which was exacerbated by China's economic reforms and liberalization of its citizens' rights to travel, followed by the collapse of the Soviet Union. These developments eventually led to today's stiff global competition, in which progressively more countries try to find ways to attract migrants with the desired skills. In most cases, the increased emphasis on migrants with those skills usually goes hand-in-hand with efforts to exclude migrants without them, thereby furthering inequalities around the world. I contend that any study of today's global competition for migrants with skills in STEM fields should include an examination of these relationships and their impact.