Why employers won't hire

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The problem with bringing down the stubbornly high unemployment rate is that employers are learning to do more with less.

Employers still aren't hiring enough. Just look at November's disappointing employment report, which barely eked out a gain in jobs. Or better yet, look at the holiday workers at your local mall. If you can find them.

Retailers, who are reporting astrong start to the holiday shopping season, are apparently doing so with less help than in the past.

The Labor Department reported a drop of 28,000 retail jobs in the month in its employment report once it adjusted the numbers for seasonal factors. Except for 2008, when the economy was in the process of falling off a cliff, there hasn't been such a weak November for retail payrolls in in 29 years.

"There's no question that employers are being cautious about hiring, especially full-time workers," said Sung Won Sohn, economics professor at Cal State University Channel Islands. "They're not certain the recovery is for real so they're taking their time. And because of productivity gain they don't need to hire as many people."

The push to do more with less help isn't limited to stores. It can be seen in offices and factories across numerous industries.

Businesses were forced to figure how to be more productive and change the way they did business, in order to survive during the recession, said Tig Gilliam, president of the North American unit of Adecco, the world's largest job placement firm. And that isn't going away anytime soon, he said.

"It's not just getting people to do more," he said. "I think companies have stopped doing things. They've said 'It was a nice to have those extra 23 reports we used to do every week, but we don't have the people to do them.' That's not going to change."

That's a key reason the job market has remained stuck in the mud. While gross domestic product, the broadest measure of the economy, has recovered 84% of the output that was lost during the recession, but the labor market has recouped only 11% of the jobs that were lost.

"We're producing almost as much as we did before the recession, with 7.5 million less people," said Lakshman Achuthan, managing director of Economic Cycle Research Institute. "The difference is going into the productivity numbers and corporate profits."

The latest reading on productivity, which measures the economic output of each hour Americans work during a quarter, was up 2.5% from a year ago in the third quarter, the Labor Department reported this week. It's the sixth straight quarter of gains of that level or higher.

But that level of productivity can't go on forever, said Achuthan.

"There is a limit. Workers do start to push back," he said. "But business managers don't hire because they're nice guys or girls, they hire because they're scared that they'll lose business to someone else. That'll be what gets hiring done." 

Broncos Receiver McKinley in Deep Debt before Suicide

*Denver Broncos wide receiver Kenny McKinley was struggling with a gambling problem and was in debt when he committed suicide on Sept. 21, friends and family told authorities during a probe into his death.

McKinley committed suicide with a gun he had purchased months before from teammate Jabar Gaffney, who told investigators McKinley wanted the weapon for his own protection, according to an investigative report by the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Department that was obtained by The Associated Press. Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson said there was nothing inappropriate about the sale of the gun.

Detectives also determined that McKinley had spoken about suicide with at least three of his friends, including former Broncos backup quarterback Tom Brandstater. Brandstater told investigators he had lent McKinley $65,000 and that McKinley owed $40,000 in casino markers in Las Vegas.

“It’s unfortunate at a time like this that we don’t get to focus on how great of a person Kenny was and how much he meant to a lot of people,” Brandstater told the AP on Wednesday. “As for the other circumstances, Kenny was a friend in need and I would do anything for him, as he would have done for me.”

McKinley, 23, suffered a season-ending left knee injury during the first week of Broncos training camp. He underwent an operation several weeks before he shot himself in the left temple at his rental home near the Broncos’ practice facility. McKinley had injured the same knee in the Broncos’ next-to-last game in 2009.

The 131-page report, which states the investigation has closed, quoted witnesses as saying McKinley was depressed over his second knee surgery in eight months and was worried about how he would care for his toddler son when his football career was over.

Days before his death, McKinley had been ordered to pay $3,000 a month in child support by a South Carolina court. He had told friends he was being threatened with a paternity suit by another woman who said she was pregnant with his baby, according to the sheriff’s report.

McKinley had missed a South Carolina court hearing in the child support case on Sept. 14.

McKinley’s parents and Brandstater, who is now on the Miami Dolphins’ practice squad, told investigators they had been trying to help him fix his financial problems.

According to investigators, the Broncos were apparently aware of McKinley’s financial troubles.

The team’s player development director, Harold Chatman, had been asked by Brandstater’s representative to hold onto a copy of a contract Brandstater had with McKinley, stating McKinley would repay the $65,000 loan. The Broncos called it an internal matter.

The knee injury was costly financially for McKinley, who signed a four-year, $1.95 million contract with the Broncos in 2009 after they drafted him in the fifth round out of South Carolina.

The deal included a $200,200 signing bonus, and he made the rookie minimum salary of $310,000 last year. However, he had a split contract, meaning that because he was to spend all of 2010 on injured reserve, he would receive $240,000, instead of $395,000.

There were no guarantees that he’d recover from his second knee operation to earn the $480,000 due him in 2011 or $565,000 in 2012.

Bondarowicz did say that McKinley had taken out a $50,000 loan from another, unidentified party, something that a former Broncos teammate, Everette Pedescleaux, had mentioned to investigators.

The sheriff’s report quotes McKinley’s father, Kenneth McKinley, as saying that he and his wife were getting many letters for their son at their home in Mableton, Ga., from casinos in Las Vegas. He said bill collectors also were calling his house asking for his son and that he had spoken with his son about managing his money better.

The elder McKinley said he also suspected his son was having financial problems because he had only recently begun using a credit card that he’d given him in college.

Brandstater told investigators that McKinley had a “major gambling problem” and that he told him that he owed $40,000 in Las Vegas. He said the two of them had dinner for 10 straight nights in May trying to “hash out ways to fix it.”

Brandstater told investigators he eventually lent McKinley $65,000 and that he nearly emptied his bank accounts to help out his friend. McKinley was supposed to send Brandstater $7,500 from each paycheck but hadn’t paid back any of the money, Brandstater said.

Brandstater said he trusted McKinley to repay him but that his financial adviser insisted that a contract be drawn up and that a copy be given to the Broncos. Part of the pact included McKinley providing the title to his two vehicles as collateral. He said McKinley also gave him two watches, a Breitling and a Gucci valued together at $30,000, as well as a gold necklace to hold as collateral.

Brandstater said he returned the necklace to McKinley, who sold it for $6,000. Brandstater told investigators he told McKinley to keep that money because he was in such dire financial straits.

Tom Brandstater

Brandstater told investigators that about a week before he lent him the money, McKinley said “that he could save everyone the burden and just kill himself.”

Brandstater told the AP that McKinley quickly assured him he wasn’t serious about committing suicide.

Two women who were baby-sitting McKinley’s toddler son when they discovered he had killed himself each told investigators that McKinley had talked about suicide.

The mother of McKinley’s child, Shayla Lites, told investigators that a family court in South Carolina had ordered McKinley to pay $3,000 a month in child support, a figure that was based on his 2009 earnings. She said he was supposed to provide documents to the court showing his current salary. She said McKinley had been paying her $1,500 a month — and that she planned to return anything over that amount to him because she knew he had financial problems.

Gaffney, a Broncos receiver, told investigators he sold McKinley a gun in April. Gaffney had bought the gun in 2004 in Houston.

“Kenny told me he wanted a gun for his personal protection and being that I have a couple of legally owned firearms, I sold him one of mine that I didn’t want anymore,” Gaffney said in a statement to deputies.

Gaffney wasn’t in the Broncos locker room during the 45-minute media access Wednesday.

Snowman with noose appalls Idaho home's neighbors

The Associated Press

HAYDEN, Idaho — A white separatist drew complaints from neighbors and a visit from law enforcement officers after building a snowman shaped like a member of the Ku Klux Klan on his front lawn.  Kootenai County sheriff's deputies told Mark Eliseuson Wednesday that he could be charged with a crime because the 10-foot-tall snowman was holding what appeared to be a noose. Deputies were called by neighbors who were appalled by the pointy-headed snowman with two dark eyes.

Hayden for decades earned notoriety for being near the former rural compound of the Aryan Nations.

Eliseuson could have been charged with creating a public nuisance. Idaho law defines such a nuisance as anything "offensive to the senses" or that interferes with the comfort of an entire neighborhood. Eliseuson removed the noose and toppled the snowman after he talked with officers.

Eliseuson told KXLY-TV of Spokane that he sees nothing wrong with the snowman. But other people did.

"It's such a message of hate," said Amber Caldwell, who saw the snowman while visiting her cousin in the neighborhood. "My kids asked me about it and I had to explain what that symbol means."

Eliseuson has angered neighbors in the past by flying Aryan Nations flags at his home. At Halloween he passed out bullet casings after he said he ran out of candy.

Mark Eliseuson stands in his yard in Hayden, Idaho, Thursday, Dec. 2, 2010, next to what is left of a snowman that had depicted a white hooded figure associated with the Klu Klux Klan. After being notified by law-enforcement officers that he could be charged with a crime because the snowman was holding what appeared to be a noose, Eliseuson said he removed the snowman's head. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)

A now-headless snowman that had depicted a white hooded figure associated with the Klu Klux Klan is shown in the front yard of Mark Eliseuson, in Hayden, Idaho, Thursday, Dec. 2, 2010. After being notified by law-enforcement officers that he could be charged with a crime because the snowman was holding what appeared to be a noose, Eliseuson said he removed the snowman's head. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)

The IRS's problem with minorities

By Shawn Tully, senior editor-at-largeDecember 2, 2010: 10:42 AM ET

FORTUNE -- Is the Internal Revenue Service targeting African-American and Hispanic taxpayers? That's the conclusion of a new study provided exclusively to Fortune titled "IRS Enforcement's Impact on Minority Communities," conducted by Thomas M. Evans, CEO of TaxLifeboat, a firm that advises taxpayers on resolving their problems with the IRS.

Evans stresses strongly that the disproportionate number of IRS actions against minorities isn't intentional. Rather, he charges, it's the result of overly rigid, highly-automated enforcement policies that waste taxpayer money by pursuing low-earners who either can't pay, or owe virtually nothing.

Worse, it pushes minority workers who were paying some, if not all, of their tax burden from mainstream jobs into the shadowy cash economy. "The IRS enforcement actions drive workers and revenue out of the system," warns Evans. "Once people are caught in that mill, their life changes, and they're forced to stay in the underclass."

The IRS doesn't specify the ethnic background of Americans it hits with enforcement actions. To explore the issue, Evans examined the 1,000 zip codes where the IRS had filed the largest number of liens from July 2009 to July 2010. He then mined the 2000 Census, the most recent source available, to determine the racial makeup of those areas. Evans found that, on average, the populations of those 1,000 locales with the nation's highest level of tax enforcement were 22% African-American and 24% Hispanic. That's approximately double the proportion of those minorities in entire country.

The top twenty zip codes for IRS liens range from sections in big cities such as New York and Chicago to suburbs such as Lawrenceville, Georgia outside of Atlanta, Katy, Texas a suburb of Houston, and New Castle, Delaware, a town near Wilmington.

Hiding in plain sight

Why do IRS actions fall so heavily on minorities? The principal reason is that low-earners, including an outsized number of blacks and Hispanics according to Evans' findings, commit the violations that are easiest to detect. The IRS's powerful computers screen the W-2 forms from employers against the returns filed by individuals. If the worker didn't file a return at all, or if they claim too many exemptions, the IRS automatically launches an "examination." That step frequently leads to an enforcement action, which can trigger severe penalties----garnishing wages, seizing homes, freezing bank accounts or the filing of tax liens that ruin credit ratings.

According to Evans, who advises thousands of low-income clients a year, many workers are so uninformed about the tax system that they think the amount withheld from their paychecks is sufficient payment. Hence, they don't file returns at all.

Others, he says, don't intentionally cheat, but "don't think that it's a priority to be tax compliant." They may neglect to report such items as credit card debt forgiveness, which is classified as income under the tax code. And, says Evans, they simply can't afford the $100 to $300 for an advisor to prepare their returns.

It frequently takes a couple of years for the IRS to present these folks with a bill for back taxes. That number can be scary: Adding interest and penalties doubles the amount due in less than five years.

Remarkably, many of the low-earners with IRS problems don't owe anything. Evans recently worked with a truck driver who hadn't filed a return in seven years, and faced a bill for $60,000. "He'd been paying through withholding," says Evans. "When we finally filed all the returns, and included his deductions, he owed $400."

When the IRS garnishes their wages, many former factory workers or security guards stop looking for higher-paying jobs, or quit their jobs altogether in favor of work in businesses where they're paid in cash. Nor are the enforcement actions cost effective, to say the least. "The IRS has no leverage with the poor, as they would with the affluent," says Evans. In the past eight years, spending on IRS enforcement has increased 17.8% adjusted for inflation. But revenue per enforcement action has fallen by almost one-third.

Evans isn't alone in his criticism of the IRS's pursuit of low-earners. Nina Olson, the National Taxpayer Advocate, an independent IRS official who reports to Congress on tax issues, said in a recent report, "The IRS policies fail to address the needs of low income taxpayers, and its lien-filing policies are harming and will continue to harm taxpayers' financial viability without strong evidence that they promote future compliance with the tax laws or even bring in substantial revenue."

Through a spokesman, the IRS declined to comment without seeing the report, which will be made public later on Thursday.

Evans proposes several solutions. First, it's important to notify people of their violations quickly, before they're swamped with interest and penalties. Second, the IRS needs to spend more on educating and working with taxpayers who don't understand the importance of filing returns -- moving to a far flatter, simpler tax system would greatly increase compliance.

Fortunately, a flat tax could be making a comeback as part of the solution to the deficit crisis. Scrapping the complexities that confuse low-earning minorities would be a major, mostly overlooked benefit of a flat tax. 

Unemployed African American Single Moms Not an Average Statistic in 2010 Economic Recovery

Moguldom Media Group. All Rights Reserved

On the average the typical unemployed person is a man.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) most recent release gives the unemployment rate for men at 10% of the male workforce who are 20 years old or over.  It is 7.9 % for women of a similar description.  In December 2007 both men and women had the same 4.4% rate of unemployment.  The overall average rate of unemployment now stands at 9.7% of the American work force age 20 and over.

There is a subgroup hidden within the data.  Singlewomen with children at 11.6% are twice as likely to be unemployed as married women with a spouse in the home at 6.1%.  The proportion has remained the same for a decade but now collectively the rates are 68% higher than before the recession.

The results are exacerbated during difficult economic times.  On average a woman earns 77% of that earned by the average man.  Children as well are disproportionately affected.  Families headed by a singlemother have 20% of the nation’s children.

Demographically unmarried men and women tend to be less educated and younger and diverse ethnically than their married counterparts.  There is a discrepancy between the college graduates with an unemployment rate of 5% and the opposite end of the education spectrum with an unemploymentrate of 15.6%.

The racial divide is as stark.  At one point in 2010 15% of African Americans were unemployed vs. 8.8% of White Americans.

The effects of unemployment on Single African American Mothers have been described as cascading.  There is no one to baby sit while they are seeking other jobs.  They loose benefits not only for themselves but also for their children.  There is less margin in money available to provide for school supplies and extra-curricular activities.  The safety net has been shredded.  They are much more likely to end up homeless.  There is no savings cushion to see them through. The effects of unemployment hit their families immediately.

Back to the Days of Blackface

A toothpaste brand popular in China is criticized as racially offensive.

Of all the unfamiliar products in a Chinese supermarket, one of the most shocking to American visitors is a toothpaste featuring the logo of a minstrel singer in a top hat, flashing a white smile. Even more shocking: the paste, known as Darlie in English and as Black People Toothpaste in Chinese, is a product of the Hawley & Hazel Group, a Hong Kong–based company established in 1933, which is now owned in part by the Colgate-Palmolive Co.

Darlie used to be called Darkie. According to the book America Brushes Up: The Uses and Marketing of Toothpaste and Toothbrushes in the Twentieth Century, the CEO of Hawley & Hazel saw blackface performer Al Jolson in the U.S. and thought, “Jolson’s wide smile and bright teeth would make an excellent toothpaste logo.” He was right: the firm now claims to be one of the market leaders of toothpaste products in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia.

After Colgate purchased 50 percent of the firm in 1985, religious groups, African-Americans, and company shareholders protested the racially offensive nature of the brand. After more than three years of criticism, Colgate switched the name from Darkie to Darlie and modified the logo to a less crude version of a black man. In 1989The New York Times quoted the Colgate-Palmolive chairman as saying, ‘’It’s just plain wrong … The morally right thing dictated that we must change [in a way] that is least damaging to the economic interests of our partners.’’

Yet the Chinese name of the product has remained unchanged. And China is not exactly a paradise of racial harmony. While the crucial dichotomy in China is between Chinese and non-Chinese, many blacks face discrimination in the country. A Ghanaian who lives in China and asked to remain anonymous told NEWSWEEK that a prospective employer told him, “We can’t hire you because you’re black.”

Still, the Chinese don’t view the toothpaste’s name as something reprehensible. “To most people in China it wouldn’t even occur to them that Black People Toothpaste is offensive,” says P. T. Black, who researches Chinese consumers. According to the Chinese news site Southcn.com, Hawley & Hazel has even trademarked the name and image and recently sued two companies in Shenzhen for making toothpaste using a similar logo with the words “Black People.” The court ordered the defendants to pay more than $300,000 in damages.

Yet Colgate is a Western company and, as such, “should know better,” says Kwame Dougan, an African-Canadian living in China. Colgate declined NEWSWEEK’s interview requests, instead releasing a statement saying, “There are different perspectives on this issue.” Hawley & Hazel also declined an interview request. Darlie doesn’t exactly advertise its relationship with Colgate; Colgate’s Web site has only two mentions of Darlie, both of which talk about how the brand is driving growth in the Asia-Pacific region. Darlie products examined in China for this story featured no mention of the Colgate label.

“I think that the brand should simply be retired,” says Laura Berry, executive director of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, one of the organizations that originally pressured Colgate to fix its Darkie brand. Until then, Darlie smiles on.

Held as slaves, now free

See show times »

By Scott Bronstein, Amber Lyon and Alexandra Poolos, CNN

December 2, 2010 3:32 p.m. EST

"Nicole," left, and Zena, right, thought they were coming to the U.S. for an education.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Zena and Nicole were sent from West Africa to the U.S. with promise of an education
• They and others ended up working as slaves in hair braiding salons in New Jersey
• They spoke out for the first time about their ordeal to CNN
• "American Slaves: Hiding in Plain Sight" airs tonight on AC360° at 10 ET on CNN

For more on this story, don't miss a special "AC360°" series, "American Slaves: Hiding in Plain Sight," tonight at 10 ET on CNN.

Newark, New Jersey (CNN) -- They arrived in the United States from West Africa, young girls held against their will and forced to work for hours on end. But this time, it didn't happen hundreds of years ago.

Nicole's journey started in 2002, when she was barely 12, in her small village in western Ghana. She and about 20 other girls were held in plain sight, but always under the watchful eyes of their captors.

"It was like being trapped, like being in a cage," said "Nicole," now 19. CNN agreed not to use her real name.

"I always have to behave, behave, behave, behave. No freedom at all."

Oakland authorities fight prostitution

Trafficked in plain sight

The girls' families sent them to the United States after being assured they would receive a better education. But once they arrived, they were forced to work in hair braiding shops across the Newark area -- just a short drive from New York City, right in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty.

The girls, who are now young women, have never spoken publicly before, until now.

"It was horrible," said Zena Amevor, who was 15 when she was brought over from Togo. "Sometimes there was not enough food for us to eat. ... It was like a prison. I was just stuck there. ... It was horrible."

For the first time, the former slaves provided details about their horrifying odyssey and an intimate view into the world of human trafficking and contemporary slavery.

"Jacqueline" was 13 when her family sent her to the United States, not knowing that a woman she called "auntie" was a human trafficker. It was unclear if the woman was a blood relative.

"My dad ... worked hard so I could go to school, so when my auntie came and told my family that I could go to a school in the U.S. ... they trusted her," she said. "Everyone was happy about it."

The girls worked in the salons right out in the open, in front of customers. They were on their feet all day, sometimes for more than 12 hours, weaving intricate and elaborate hair braids, seven days a week.

This went on for more than five years.

"We stood there all day, just braiding," Jacqueline said. "If they want really small braids, you stay there sometimes until 2 a.m. ... That's every day."

At times, they were forced to braid the hair of American teenagers no older than they were -- girls who were free and had no idea the people braiding their hair were slaves.

"I wished I could go with them," Nicole said. "Most of the time, I'd end up just breaking down later crying ... because when I see teenagers going around, going to the movies and just being a teen ... I just couldn't understand why my life has to be this way ... "

In one of the many ironies in the case, the customers whose hair was braided by the slave girls were mostly African-American women, many of whom could have been descendants of slaves brought to America generations ago.

Slavery through trafficking continues widely today in the United States, though often undetected, according to law enforcement officials.

Nicole, Zena, Jacqueline and the other girls were held in groups in several houses around Newark and East Orange, New Jersey. The girls were brought to the United States at different times between 2002 and 2007, according to court documents. As the group grew, the traffickers ran out of places to put them and had to rent more living quarters.

The homes were always in the middle of residential areas with manicured lawns and nice houses, often near churches, schools and community buildings.

"I think it's hard for people to believe that in 2010, we have people who actually put people in slavery," said Paul Fishman, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, whose office successfully prosecuted the case. "It's the most fundamental and intolerable violation of human rights."

When I [saw] teenagers going around, going to the movies and just being a teen ... I just couldn't understand why my life has to be this way ...
--"Nicole," human trafficking victim

The traffickers convicted in this case were a mother, father and son who also came from West Africa, according to court documents and law enforcement officials.

Nicole, Zena and Jacqueline described living in fear shortly after they arrived in the United States, forced to work by day at the hair salons and sleeping in groups on the floor at night.

"When I got here ... I asked her if I was going to school, and she said there was no school," Jacqueline said, referring to her auntie, the trafficking ringleader.

"I said, 'I'm not going to school?' [and] she said, 'no' ... and that was her decision and she wasn't going to change it."

The captors controlled the girls by beating them, withholding food, keeping them separated from anyone else and, at times, through sexual abuse, according to court documents.

The young women who spoke to CNN described years of cruelty, physical abuse, beatings with wood or metal objects, extreme isolation and sleeping on mattresses on floors in filthy conditions. Even their phone calls back to their families were monitored by their captors.

"I always thought of running [away], but I know nobody," Zena said. "I don't know where to go, didn't have [any] friends, nobody to talk to, so it was kind of hard. ... I had nowhere to go to."

Five years after the girls began arriving, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents received a tip and began extensive surveillance on the houses where the girls were kept.

After months of surveillance, the ICE agents raided the houses in 2007. Inside, they found the girls and mattresses on the floor. The traffickers had hidden bags of cash and the girls' passports.

Peter Edge, who led the team of agents, said none of the girls' customers ever called officials to help.

"Hundreds of people came into these salons, they probably witnessed things out of the ordinary," said Edge, special agent in charge of ICE's Homeland Security Investigations in Newark.

"These girls were shielded from the outside world, virtually hidden in plain sight ... from everything else that was around them."

Edge and the girls said several customers asked about the girls' ages, and the girls -- following the orders of their captors -- lied and said they were 18.

"I wish one of my customers ... would have gone to police," Nicole said. "I wish they would have helped me."

In the 2007 raid, the ICE agents found a notebook the girls used to track the tips they received, but couldn't keep, at the hair salon. Ironically, on the cover of the notebook was a picture of the Statue of Liberty.

More than two years later, Akouavi Afolabi; her husband, Lassissi Afolabi; and their son, Dereck Hounakey, were convicted of running the trafficking ring. Akouavi Afolabi was the ringleader, while her husband and son were accomplices, according to court documents.

In September of this year, a Newark court sentenced Akouavi Afolabi to 27 years in prison, while her husband received 24 years and their son received 4½ years.

The girls had to testify against the Afolabis in court.

It's so profitable that we are seeing some drug traffickers get out of drug trafficking and into human trafficking. 
--Bridgette Carr, law professor and trafficking expert

RELATED TOPICS

• Human Trafficking
• U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
• West Africa

"I remember crying. All I did was cry. It was overwhelming," Nicole said. "I told myself, 'She finally got what she deserved' ... she did really, really wrong. She treated us bad. And she was heartless ... and I'm happy she was caught."

Court records show the Afolabis knew many of the families whose girls they lured away to become their slaves. They had an elaborate scheme to lure the girls: Mrs. Afolabi would approach families of young girls in Ghana and Togo, where she had connections, and tell the families she would give the girls an education in the United States. They then used fraudulent visa papers to sneak the girls into the country.

Experts say the main reason for most modern-day human trafficking is money.

"Human trafficking is extremely profitable," said Bridgette Carr, a law professor and a national expert on human trafficking.

The customers at the hair braiding salon where Zena and Nicole were forced to work would sometimes pay as much as $200 to $400 for elaborate braiding that would take many hours to complete.

The traffickers took every penny made by the girls, both in tips and payments for their hair braiding. They made about $4 million, according to court documents.

"It's so profitable that we are seeing some drug traffickers get out of drug trafficking and into human trafficking," said Carr, who teaches law at the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor.

Carr heads a clinic that is helping Nicole and many of the other girls move ahead with their lives.

"Sadly, the work of our clinic is necessary in every community in America," she said. "Human trafficking, also known as modern-day slavery, exists in big cities, in small towns, in rural areas with no towns, exists in restaurants, in hair salons, in hotels and in farmwork.

"Almost every industry you can think of, there is an opportunity there for someone to be exploited. This is everywhere in the U.S."

Today, Nicole, Zena, Jacqueline and the other girls are trying to move on with their lives. Several are in high school, and one has recently been accepted into college.

Most of the girls have not been able to return home to see their families in West Africa. When asked why she agreed to finally talk out about such a painful chapter of her life, Nicole said she wanted to raise awareness about what other young girls may be going through.

"I want to tell people that slavery exists," she said. "It's huge, and it's really happening here."