We are tired. We are going home to farm and raise cattle.
In the days following Ho Chi Minh City's eased lockdown, nearly 90,000 migrant workers chose departure over return — not in anger, but in exhaustion. They had come to the city carrying the quiet ambitions of rural people seeking better lives, and the pandemic had answered those ambitions with confinement, joblessness, and fear. Their leaving is less a labour crisis than a reckoning: a moment when the fragile compact between urban promise and human endurance finally broke.
- Nearly 90,000 workers fled Ho Chi Minh City the moment restrictions eased, many vowing not to return after months trapped in cramped rooms without income or relief.
- The exodus has gutted Vietnam's manufacturing capacity at the worst possible moment — construction sites sit at 60% staffing, and suppliers for Nike, Adidas, and Apple have suspended or scaled back operations.
- Global brands are already feeling the tremors: Nike cut sales forecasts, Apple's iPhone 13 faces delivery delays, and fashion companies are quietly scouting alternative manufacturing hubs across Asia.
- City officials issued public pleas for workers to stay, but the appeals landed too late — workers had already weighed another potential lockdown against the modest safety of home, and home had won.
- With less than 11% of Vietnam's population fully vaccinated and nearly 20,000 deaths concentrated heavily in Ho Chi Minh City, the fear of a repeat crisis is not paranoia — it is lived experience driving rational flight.
The weekend Ho Chi Minh City began easing its COVID-19 lockdown, nearly 90,000 people walked out. Most were migrant workers who had come seeking better wages and urban opportunity. Now they were leaving — and they were not planning to return.
Tran Thi Them, 32, was among them. She had lost her garment factory job in July and spent months confined to a ten-square-meter room with her husband and infant, unable to work or leave. "We left our home behind for the city in search for better jobs," she said, "but now we are tired. We are going home to farm and raise cattle." Her words carried the weight of the entire exodus.
The timing was devastating. Vietnam had just recorded its worst quarterly GDP contraction on record, and the city desperately needed workers to restart its factories. But the workers had already made their calculation: another COVID wave could trap them again, jobless and confined. Home, however modest, offered family, land, and subsistence.
The labour shortage was immediate and severe. A Coteccons Construction subcontractor described operating at just 60 percent capacity with no viable path to recruitment. Nike and Adidas suppliers had already suspended operations earlier in the year. Apple's iPhone 13 faced extended delivery times because Vietnamese factories assembling camera modules couldn't run at full strength. Fashion brands began looking toward other low-cost manufacturing hubs across Asia.
City vice chairman Le Hoa Binh made a public appeal — "Please don't leave, and stay to work" — but it arrived too late. The workers had already weighed their options and decided the city no longer offered what they had come for.
Underneath the labour crisis lay a deeper rupture. With fewer than 11 percent of Vietnam's 98 million people fully vaccinated, and Ho Chi Minh City accounting for nearly half the country's cases and 77 percent of its deaths, the fear of another lockdown was not irrational — it was earned. What the exodus revealed was not simply a shortage of workers, but a collapse of trust: tens of thousands of people concluding, simultaneously, that the city's promise had proven too fragile to stake their lives on again.
The weekend after Ho Chi Minh City began easing its months-long COVID-19 lockdown, nearly 90,000 people walked out. Most were migrant workers who had come to the city seeking better wages, better futures—the standard calculus of rural life versus urban opportunity. Now they were leaving, and they were not coming back quietly.
Tran Thi Them, 32, stood in line for a mandatory COVID test before boarding a bus home to Dong Thap province in the Mekong Delta. She had lost her job at a garment factory in July when the lockdown began. For months after that, she had been confined to a ten-square-meter rented room with her husband and their eight-month-old baby, unable to leave, unable to work, unable to see a way forward. "We left our home behind for the city in search for better jobs but now we are tired," she said. "We are going home to farm and raise cattle." The exhaustion in that sentence carried the weight of the entire exodus.
The timing was brutal. Vietnam's economy had just posted its worst quarterly performance on record—a GDP contraction driven entirely by the lockdown measures meant to contain the virus. The city and its surrounding industrial provinces were desperate to restart manufacturing, to rehire, to recover. But the workers had already made their decision. Many feared that if another wave of infections arrived, they would be trapped again in those small rooms, jobless and confined. Better to go home where at least there was family, land, and the possibility of subsistence.
The labour shortage that resulted was not theoretical. A subcontractor for Coteccons Construction, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not permitted to talk to journalists, described the situation plainly: the company had only 60 percent of the workers needed for its projects, and recruiting more had become nearly impossible. Across the city, similar stories were multiplying. Nike and Adidas suppliers had already suspended operations earlier in the year. Nike had cut its sales forecasts and warned of holiday delays. Apple's new iPhone 13 faced longer-than-expected delivery times because the factories in Vietnam that assembled the camera module could not operate at full capacity. Fashion brands were beginning to look elsewhere entirely, away from Vietnam and toward other low-cost manufacturing hubs in Asia.
The city's vice chairman, Le Hoa Binh, made a public appeal: "Please don't leave, and stay to work. The city is facing serious labour shortages." It was a plea that arrived too late. The workers had already weighed their options—the risk of another lockdown, the months of confinement, the loss of income, the separation from family—and decided that the city no longer offered them what they had come for.
Underlying all of this was a vaccination problem. Vietnam had one of the lowest vaccination rates in Southeast Asia. Less than 11 percent of its 98 million people had received two doses. The country had reported more than 808,000 cases and nearly 20,000 deaths, with Ho Chi Minh City alone accounting for almost half the cases and 77 percent of the deaths. That disparity was not lost on the workers leaving. They understood, perhaps better than anyone, that the lockdown could happen again. And if it did, they would be the ones confined to small rooms, the ones without income, the ones with the most to lose.
What was unfolding was not simply a labour shortage. It was a rupture in the relationship between workers and the city, between the promise of urban employment and the reality of precarious work during a pandemic. The exodus represented a calculation made by tens of thousands of people simultaneously: that home, however modest, was safer than a city that had shown it could lock down without warning and leave them stranded.
Citas Notables
We left our home behind for the city in search for better jobs but now we are tired. We are going home to farm and raise cattle.— Tran Thi Them, 32, garment factory worker
The city is facing serious labour shortages.— Le Hoa Binh, vice chairman of Ho Chi Minh City's People's Committee
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why did so many workers leave all at once? Was there a specific trigger?
The lockdown had been going on for months. When it finally eased, workers didn't see an opportunity to return to normal—they saw a window to escape before it closed again. They'd already lost jobs, spent months confined to tiny rooms. The fear of another wave, another lockdown, was the real trigger.
But didn't the city need them? Didn't employers try to convince them to stay?
The vice chairman made a public appeal. But appeals don't pay rent or bring back the job you lost in July. The workers had already done the math. A garment factory job in Ho Chi Minh City, even when it exists, doesn't compete with the certainty of going home.
What happens to the global supply chains now?
Nike, Adidas, Apple—they're all feeling it. But this isn't just about one lockdown. It's about whether Vietnam can be trusted as a manufacturing hub if the vaccination rate stays this low and another wave is always possible.
Is this permanent? Will the workers come back?
That depends on whether the city can offer them something worth the risk. Right now, it can't. And if another lockdown happens, the answer becomes even clearer.
What does this say about the broader economy?
Vietnam just posted its worst GDP quarter on record. Now the workers who were supposed to drive the recovery are gone. It's not just a labour shortage—it's a crisis of confidence in the system itself.