The Great Depression resulted in record-high unemployment and displaced millions of Americans. Many were uprooted by foreclosure, industrial failure, or rapid changes in agricultural markets. Rothstein photographed uprooted workers and the homeless across the country who, like the fictional Joad family in John Steinbeck’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Grapes of Wrath, were living in dangerous, unsanitary roadside conditions.

The warm climate and agricultural abundance of Florida attracted many migrants in search of a better tomorrow. Arthur Rothstein made a study of this family of eight. They had travelled from Tennessee to Florida for work in a citrus packinghouse but were living in a \"lean-to" shack made of rusty galvanized tin, wood scraps and burlap. Rothstein’s photographs were evidence that American migrant families needed assistance. The agency that had sent him to Florida—the US Farm Security Administration—responded by building housing and health clinics for migrant workers. Today, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development continues to fund housing for Florida’s seasonal agricultural workers.