I got hired at a Bangladesh sweatshop. Meet my 9-year-old boss [video]

Post by philwelch » Sat, Oct 12, 2013, 10:10 PM UTC

RodericDay wrote: post #24

L_Rahman wrote: post #16

As someone who's spent his life roughly equally split across Bangladesh and America, I thought I'd provide some perspective. The questions I ask myself about this situation are: 1. Are the lives of the people who work in these factories better or worse as a result of these jobs existing? The answer I end up arriving at repeatedly is that it is a resounding improvement in the lives of almost everyone. RMG factories em…

The way I answer people that say this is: It's not good enough. Yes, you can come up with all the explanation whatsoever you want to how this is a ~local maxima~ of happiness, but the fact is that we live on a much higher one with tons of disposable income and benefit from their work... so it s not a ~global maxima~ (not even close) so we should do better. What can I say? I'm definitely more to the left than most peo…

Post by kansface » Sat, Oct 12, 2013, 10:21 PM UTC

ericd wrote: post #79

crag wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

("... Most of the owners could obviously afford to pay employees better given the incredible amounts of wealth that the factory owners have accumulated and having gone to school with some of their children, I know quite a few factory owners personally. The reason they don't pay more comes down to simply business principles. The objective of a labor intensive business is to drive costs down the lowest possible amount…

It's not that simple. If you pay more than the next factory over for the same work, you become uncompetitive with that factory, and you start losing contracts. If that becomes bad enough, that will drive you under. This is why minimum wages are important - to make it so your neighbor also has to pay the better rate as well. This breaks down somewhat when your factory is competing with another factory in another count…

Post by kansface » Sat, Oct 12, 2013, 10:38 PM UTC

harichinnan wrote: post #76

L_Rahman wrote: post #16

As someone who's spent his life roughly equally split across Bangladesh and America, I thought I'd provide some perspective. The questions I ask myself about this situation are: 1. Are the lives of the people who work in these factories better or worse as a result of these jobs existing? The answer I end up arriving at repeatedly is that it is a resounding improvement in the lives of almost everyone. RMG factories em…

I wish there where campaigns against exploitative child labor in US and western world. So if a given country's minimum wages are low and they seem to be exporting a lot, the campaign could call for Boycott of products from the country until they raise minimum wages. May be there should be a kickstarter of sorts for launching such campaigns (Money to cover for marketing and other expenses).

Post by tptacek » Sat, Oct 12, 2013, 10:50 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #82

jmduke wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am unexperienced when it comes to such matters, but: 1. Quitting means you are no longer making money, and if that was an acceptable endgame then you likely wouldn't be employed in such conditions in the first place; 2. I find it extremely unlikely that such factory owners would have a dearth of prospective (eager, even) employees.

#1 Quitting does not mean you never look for another job or quit on the first day etc. It means when you perceive working for said factory is not worth it you do something else. #2 Having a large labor supply suggests the job is competitive. However, even if that's the case having people constantly quit increases training costs. The point of all of this is industrialization tends to follow a path where people move fr…

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Oct 12, 2013, 10:59 PM UTC

PeterisP wrote: post #91

calibraxis wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for enduring the indignant replies! Yes, this place is dominated by strata of society driven to justify organized child labor, even after seeing the face of one such 9 year old. Throughout history, such people justified all sorts of things. I know many like them in person, and am constantly weirded out. (One reason I dislike hanging out with programmers, managers and investors.) The banally evil things stum…

It's not justifying the horrible situation - it's pointing out a fact that the obvious naive solution (prohibition) would bring more harm than good to those poor people.