Office and the Crack Alternative

Office Work and the Crack Alternative is an article in which Philippe Bourgois argues that due to a high amount of job loss, drug dealing is what people now look at as a job and there has been an increase on drugs in New York. Puerto Rican immigrants cannot get a job here in the U.S, first of all they don't have an education and second because they arrived in the U.S illegally in which states that they cannot find a job as easy as a U.S citizen. Working in manufacturing jobs is the only job that Puerto Ricans can find, but working in these factories is not a very stable job and Puerto Ricans are losing their jobs and are now turning to drug dealing. In this neighborhood "El Barrio", in which Philippe Bourgois lives in with his family, is a neighborhood where there is a lot of drug dealing taking place, just a few blocks or even feet from where they live. Heroin, Crack, Marijuana, Cocaine, Mescaline, bootleg alcohol, Valium, angel dust, hypodermic needles, and tobacco are all examples of drugs that are being sold in this neighborhood and are just a few yards of where Philippe Bourgois lives. Several doctors operate "pill mills" just around where Philippe's house is located in which they write prescriptions for opiates and barbiturates.

Drug dealing begins in a person's life just when they are adolescents. They either go to school and get an education or they drop out of school and they have to get a job. These teenagers didn't even finish high school so they go to a job in which they get a lot of money and don't work as hard. For adolescents that come from low income families and getting into the drug dealing business, helps them buy what they have always wanted and there needs that they didn't have as a child and now that they are making "illegal" money, they buy what they and what they've always wanted.

Primo is a manager for a video game arcade. He sells five vials of crack in the block where Philippe lived. Primo was a junior high dropout, he became agent who moved the factory from the inner city. Due to this change, it caused many employees to lose their jobs, and the last resource they had to make money was turning into drug dealers. Primo inspired respect and fear, in order to be successful in his office career, he had to leave his street identity and stick to the professional identity. At work Primo would get insulted by his boss, because of his Puerto Rican accent, she wouldn't let him answer the phones. Racism is a big factor and "racist" was what Primo's boss was, "that bitch just didn't like my Puerto Rican accent"(Primo, pg.26).

During the years, the U.S economy records growth in history, Mexican immigrants has gone up drastically in East Harlem, Marijuana is more popular throughout the youth than Heroin and crack, and the War of Drugs into a public policy of incarcerating the social marginal. Crack, cocaine,