<P> An indentured servant or indentured laborer is an employee (indenturee) within a system of unfree labor who is bound by a signed or forced contract (indenture) to work for a particular employer for a fixed time . The contract often lets the employer sell the labor of an indenturee to a third party . Indenturees usually enter into an indenture for a specific payment or other benefit, or to meet a legal obligation, such as debt bondage . On completion of the contract, indentured servants were given their freedom, and occasionally plots of land . In many countries, systems of indentured labor have now been outlawed, and are banned by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a form of slavery . </P> <P> Until the late 18th century, indentured servitude was very common in British North America . It was often a way for poor Europeans to immigrate to the American colonies: they signed an indenture in return for a costly passage . After their indenture expired, the immigrants were free to work for themselves or another employer . It has been argued by at least one economist that indentured servitude occurred largely as "an institutional response to a capital market imperfection". </P>

In early virginia the system of indentured servitude