- Navigating the U.S. tax system is confusing for anyone. But when you’re a migrant farmworker, filing taxes can be even more confusing. Most migrant farmworkers are immigrants, low-income, and unfamiliar with U.S. tax policies. A majority of them are monolingual Spanish speakers with limited literacy, and live in rural areas with few culturally-competent social services. This makes farmworkers vulnerable to dishonest or untrained tax preparers. As workers move from farm to farm, getting all of their tax documents together and ready for tax filing season is no easy task. By failing to file taxes, migrant farmworkers may lose important refunds, risk having their wages seized by the IRS, and jeopardize immigration opportunities for themselves and their family members.
CUP teamed up with the Pennsylvania Farmworker Project, designer Andrew Sloat, and illustrator Michela Buttignol to create En El Campo De Los Impuestos (In The Field Of Taxes), a Spanish language fold-out poster. The illustrated poster guides migrant farmworkers–regardless of immigration status–through the tax filing process. By visually highlighting the benefits of filing, the risks of not filing, where and when to seek help, and all of the documents needed along the way, the guide will help farmworkers file for taxes with or without a preparer, and access the important benefits of filing.
The Pennsylvania Farmworker Project is distributing thousands of posters in the state of Pennsylvania and nationally, through their network of partner organizations.
Get your copy of the poster here.
The cover of En El Campo De Los Impuestos.
Resources & Links
Pennsylvania Farmworker Project provides legal assistance to low-income farmworkers in the state of Pennsylvania and works with community organizations and government agencies to educate farmworkers about their legal rights.
Andrew Sloat is a graphic designer and filmmaker. Currently the creative director at BAM, he has also worked on books, identities, educational videos, ads, and websites for non-profits, cultural institutions, and corporate clients. He lives and works in Brooklyn, is active in local and state-level good-government activism, and teaches in the graphic design MFA program at RISD.
Michela Butignol was born and raised in Northern Italy, and is now a New York-based freelance illustrator whose technological fortitude has enabled her to branch across a variety of mediums. In 2011, she moved to New York to become a freelance illustrator, and since has been published in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Buzzfeed, Plansponsor and other international publications. Her works have been selected for 3X3, The Magazine of Contemporary Illustration; American Illustration; and Society of Illustrators New York.
Making Policy Public is a program of the Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP). CUP partners with policy advocates and graphic designers to produce foldout posters that explain complicated policy issues, like this one.
Funding Support
Support for this project was provided by the Nathan Cummings Foundation; the National Endowment for the Arts; the Mountain School Garden Hill Fund; North Star Fund; and public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
Special Thanks
Joel Alcantar Delgado, Ponciano Carrasco Valdivia, Gabino Lara Zamudio, Angel Perez Rodriguez, Ernesto Sotero Sanchez, Rafael Valdivia Altamirano, Cristian Alberto Lara Espinoza, Ingrid Haftel, Sarah Bechdel, Iris Coloma-Gaines