Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
The world's been going to hell in a handbasket since the days of Pericles.
V-e-r-y s-l-o-w-ly. 
Somehow we muddle through and, surprisingly, things still trend upwards.
Glass half-full, half-empty?
It is good to worry about the working conditions of those that make our toys but it is also worth keeping a sense of perspective about the alternative.
Prosperity and modern lifestyles shouldn't be just for those that already have it; countries that embark on willful cheap labor programs do it with the implied intent to ramp up living standards. Japan did and South Korea, among others did it too. Those people are sacrificing so their kids won't have to just as our parents did for us.
We need to be careful; beggar-thy-neighbor protectionism makes beggars of everybody in the long term. |
This depends on the country. It may well be true in china, but I think it is less true in the case of Latin America and Africa. There the low wages are just a more thorough form of exploitation, not a strategy to develop quickly and then raise living standards. I think what is being ignored is the extent to which living standards in the which are funded by the exploitation of others. It's not that the west has figured out some great secret for raising everyone's boat; our prosperity is inversely proportional to the impoverishment of others. This applies especially to nations that function primarily as commodity producers. Political pressures and economic and even military interventions are used to keep commodity prices lower so that the citizens of the hegemonic powers may enjoy a higher standard of living. The goal, of course, is a net transfer of wealth up the social ladder: from south and east towards the north and west on a global scale, but also up the social hierarchy in the West as well. Higher living standards make an effective bribe to make the populace ignore or become implicit in the exploitation of those outside the boundaries of the nation (and thus, perhaps, outside of the circle of concern of the average westerner) or those who belong to the subaltern classes (i.e. migrant labor, urban sweatshops). Consumers who are not at the very bottom do benefit economically, just not as much as those at the top. The benefit is significant enough to cause most people to become lost in the million petty desires and manufactured needs of consumer society.
Luqman