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Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

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Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#111

Post by purplezooey »

IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #87
aussieguy1234 wrote: post #40

There needs to be a law that, for any kind of Chinese seafood to be imported, foreign officials must be allowed to inspect the conditions. They already do it for food safety. When espionage laws make other monitoring impossible, there can be zero trust in these companies to do the right thing. Allow detailed, random inspections, or your imports are blocked and you make no money.

You dont need a new law. Just work with what you have. 1 raise tariffs on chinese goods. 2 undo massive regulatory red tape on all american industry. 3 enjoy fair trade transparent production of US sourced goods Thw differential cost between still cheaper chinese goods with heavy tariffs and us good suject to heavy tax rate is more than covered by 3PL, shipping costs and supply chain delays. You dont need to make pro…

I don't think most people would assess the current state of industrial regulations in the US as having "massive regulatory red tape."

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#112

Post by purplezooey »

Despegar wrote: post #98

It's time for the US to end the sanctions on North Korea. The abuse workers face is a straight line result from the fact that virtually all aspects of their economy are under total embargo. North Korea is a nuclear state, and they will never go back to not being one. North Koreans have been working in China for decades and that won't change either because China is not going to let them become a failed state.

The argument in favor of this is that the current tensions are largely economic, and when the North Korean citizens can benefit from something closer full participation in world trade, they will be better off. Iran is in a similar situation and we had started down this path, only to be completely undone and set back 20 years by trump.

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#113

Post by [deleted] »

Despegar wrote: post #98

It's time for the US to end the sanctions on North Korea. The abuse workers face is a straight line result from the fact that virtually all aspects of their economy are under total embargo. North Korea is a nuclear state, and they will never go back to not being one. North Koreans have been working in China for decades and that won't change either because China is not going to let them become a failed state.

[deleted]

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#114

Post by ornornor »

aussieguy1234 wrote: post #40

There needs to be a law that, for any kind of Chinese seafood to be imported, foreign officials must be allowed to inspect the conditions. They already do it for food safety. When espionage laws make other monitoring impossible, there can be zero trust in these companies to do the right thing. Allow detailed, random inspections, or your imports are blocked and you make no money.

> Chinese seafood

After reading The Outlaw Ocean[0] by the article’s author, it’s clear to me there is no ethical seafood. The overwhelming majority of it comes from natural reserves where fishing is prohibited, depleting marine ecosystems, and fished by slaves who are prisoners on their fishing boats. One more reason (on top of heavy metal pollution, bottom trawling, human rights issues, bycatch, marine ecosystems destruction) for me to not eat seafood. Yes there is a microscopic chance you know of an edge case where the seafood is catches using traditional methods in sustainable quantities by a business that is virtuous… that’s not the seafood you’ll get in most supermarkets or restaurants anywhere in the world.

[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Outlaw_Ocean

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#115

Post by mrkstu »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #73
gsk22 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, poor people are better off in absolute terms than 200 years ago. No one is denying this. The question is more that, given how prosperous we are, and how much capital we have at our disposal, why do we still have so many poor people? Why is income inequality so bad?

Spot on. Saying today's poor are better off than before is a distraction from the questions we should be asking: 1) Why are there so many poor? 2) Why are their ranks increasing? To say something is better than before is not the same as saying it is as good as it could be. And yet no one is trumpeting the latter.

The main issue is the ones having a problem with the improved state of affairs reliably call on the use of other systems that have always worsened the affairs of countries that adopt them.

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#116

Post by givemeethekeys »

Despegar wrote: post #109
givemeethekeys wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't they first need to get along with their neighbors to the South?

They have for decades since the armistice agreement was signed in 1953 after the Korean War.

Wikipedia disagrees:

"In February–March 2021, South Korea continued to omit North Korea's "enemy" status from the South Korean military's White Paper after downgrading the status of Japan"

It gets worse from there.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Korea%E2%80%93South_Kore...

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#117

Post by caditinpiscinam »

jojobas wrote: post #30
gsk22 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, poor people are better off in absolute terms than 200 years ago. No one is denying this. The question is more that, given how prosperous we are, and how much capital we have at our disposal, why do we still have so many poor people? Why is income inequality so bad?

>Yes, poor people are better off in absolute terms than 200 years ago Not than poor people 200 years ago, than kings 200 years ago. No king of early 1800s could have tropical fruits, antibiotics or an entire library of human knowledge at his fingertips. >Why is income inequality so bad? Does a burger taste any worse if you know someone's having caviar? Also, how would you compare today's wealth inequality with that o…

Better than kings 200 years ago? You'd call going from Buckingham palace to homeless on the street an upgrade?

Also, libraries existed 200 years ago, as did tropical fruits. Really not sure what your argument is there.

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#118

Post by tyre »

purplezooey wrote: post #111
IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You dont need a new law. Just work with what you have. 1 raise tariffs on chinese goods. 2 undo massive regulatory red tape on all american industry. 3 enjoy fair trade transparent production of US sourced goods Thw differential cost between still cheaper chinese goods with heavy tariffs and us good suject to heavy tax rate is more than covered by 3PL, shipping costs and supply chain delays. You dont need to make pro…

I don't think most people would assess the current state of industrial regulations in the US as having "massive regulatory red tape."

Building nuclear plants here is unbelievably difficult compared with similar countries.

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#119

Post by Sabinus »

jimt1234 wrote: post #104
aussieguy1234 wrote: post #40

There needs to be a law that, for any kind of Chinese seafood to be imported, foreign officials must be allowed to inspect the conditions. They already do it for food safety. When espionage laws make other monitoring impossible, there can be zero trust in these companies to do the right thing. Allow detailed, random inspections, or your imports are blocked and you make no money.

When I lived in China years ago, I had a Chinese/local girlfriend whose brother-in-law owned a factory that "manufactured" small mechanical parts, like bolts, screws, springs, wire - stuff like that. She said that all the manufacturing was actually done in North Korea. The "factory" that he owned in China was all for show. He always knew when inspectors were coming, days in advance, and so he'd hire a few locals for…

Pre-warned inspections aren't inspections. The government or investigator should just show up at the door.

Re: Inside North Korea's Forced Labor Program

#120

Post by Sabinus »

jojobas wrote: post #88
gsk22 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's plenty of wealth. The issue is the concentration of wealth at the top. Since the current system is deeply unfair, I'm not sure why adding additional wealth to the system would make it any more fair. The majority of every extra dollar goes to the ultra rich.

The possibility to attain wealth and pass it on to your offspring has been driven the humanity since before Homo Sapiens. Removing it brings about the outright terror seen every time it gets removed. Change my mind.

It doesn't need to be one or the other. People should be able to give a good start to their kids, but not to make them as rich as countries when their children didn't do anything to deserve those resources.
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