Temporary Measures explores the connection between labor migration and economic development by comparing the experiences of South Korea and the Philippines with contract labor migration. Suzy K. Lee traces the ways the governments of these countries developed policies to promote this type of migration, beginning in the middle of the 20th century. She argues that these policies had a significant impact on the economic trajectories of both countries, affecting not only the lives of the migrant workers who were "exported," but the countries' prospects for industrialization and development.