With over 12 premier brands and more than 670 properties in 54 countries, companies like Hyatt Hotel Corporations are rapidly profiting off some of the most resourceful and beautiful regions of the world. And one of these wonders is just a coast away from the United States, oh so close to home! Cancun, often known as ‘the Paradise of the Americas’, holds title to one of the world’s busiest regions during the tourism peak seasons of spring break until late summer. International companies in foreign countries,  like those with American assets in Mexican territories, bring additional changes to the communities whether that is economic, cultural, or environmental aspects. The large presence of transnational corporations in the Yucatan state and Cancun area are bringing strong economic modifications drizzling down to the next generation; students and young adults are quickly shifting interest into joining the tourism workforce industry rather than studying toward a degree to bring larger and long-term financial support.  This is all due to economic instability.

“There are no jobs in Cancun if you don’t speak English,” said Josue, a dear friend of mine who worked in Cancun for a number of years. “It’s expensive to take classes so it’s better to work as a cleaner, learn the language, and slowly climb the chain of command.” Josue Diego began his career as a dish washer and quickly met English speakers where he then began learning the language. Of course there are grammatical errors and difficulty in pronunciation, however, Josue’s English is still better than those who learned it the same way he did.

After much introduction and conversation, Josue quickly learned that I was an English teacher and from there, our conversations about education led to a shocking discovery — a college education was never in his future. Safe to say, it existed when he was a child, but as he entered junior high school, it was “unnecessary because English is more important than a degree.” I cannot imagine one of my junior high students withdrawing from high school due to economic factors. He continued to add up the cost of university, “how can I go to school when my family and I can’t afford to pay for it?” Interestingly, with the high demand of employment, Mexican staff in Cancun also experience labor exploitation where they are paid minimum wage, if not sometimes lower. In a lengthy explanation, Josue shared that he and his colleagues would have missing hours on pay checks or added unidentified taxes. “Sometimes $2 or $3 dollars would be missing. It sounds little, but in Mexican pesos that’s about $40 to $60 [Mexican] pesos, and that’s a lot of money.” Josue does prove a point that although it sounds little to the average foreigner, $40 to $60 Mexican pesos is the equivalent of more than 6 hours of work; the federal minimum wage is roughly $9 pesos an hour (about 50 cents in USD). Now a supervisor of cleaning staff, Josue has worked a long ten years to get where he is. Often time those who follow his same career choice don’t arrive to where he is due to lack of language and other skills.

As the presence of international business increase in Cancun, the priority of education is rapidly changing to employment. It’s become largely confusing to why education is needed when you can teach yourself a language and have some sort of income. In lives just outside the beautiful white walls of resorts and sandy beaches, the surrounding communities are experiencing poverty even with employment. Though Cancun produces one-third of the Mexico’s tourism GDP, much of it belongs to international business and follows with the idea of international money stays in international economics with international businesses. Much of the income comes in but very little is given back to the local community. There is no room for growth and without employment, it’s very difficult to obtain higher education. Using the example of Josue, students are choosing short-term solutions over long-term financial development.