<p>It’s shocking how cheap some of this crap is though. I just returned from the “Dollar Tree”, which just opened in my environs. Aisles and aisles of stuff that used to sell for $5-10, all for a buck. As I was filling my basket with trinkets, it occurred to me that most of this junk was made on the backs of Chinese workers, toiling for pennies an hour. I got a few glue sticks, and some wrapping paper, but didn’t feel the need to fill a cart full of garbage, no matter how cheap it was.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the line practically went out the store. There were dozens with full carts, just like at WalMart. It’s a losing battle trying to avoid buying stuff made in China, because everything we buy is made in China. I’m just glad I have no little kids who still chew on toys.</p>
<p>“WalMart - your one-stop source of cheap Chinese plastic crap” was the bumber sticker on a car in D’s school parking lot. Made me laugh. I do not shop at WalMart, I go to Costco if I need to load up on something. Costco treats their employees better. The store I’ve been going to for ages still has the same people working their registers! And Costco sells more locally made stuff, like produce…</p>
<p>My eye-opener was a shopping spree at Target to get cheap trinkets for D to give out as friendship gifts during her sports team trip to China. I set a goal to buy stuff not made in China. It took a lot of effort and lots of small-print reading, but American-made stuff (stickers, pens, etc.) was eventually found.</p>
<p>Allmusic: Again, they’re not good jobs, but are you sugesting they are worse than the backbreaking farm labor that was the norm for many of these people before? Or are you saying that no job is better than what you view as sweatshop slave labor? Either way, I have to disagree with you.</p>
<p>Do you disagree that it is sweatshop slave labor?</p>
<p>Do you think human beings should be subjected to such working conditions who that we can buy cheap crap? And to me, whether the backbreaking farm labor was worse (which may or may not be true) is actually irrelevant to me. I am merely commenting on the conditions that bring us a ton of cheap junk to buy.</p>
<p>I don’t know. My answer to whether or not human beings should be subject to that kind of work is entirely dependent on context - average standard of living in the country, the characteristics of alternative employment, etc. etc.</p>
<p>In this case, the market will not support large scale employment of Chinese citizens at markedly higher pay levels than those already in place. Given that, I would rather see the workers employed at their current (yes, very low) salaries than not to have the opportunity to do those jobs at all.</p>
<p>And yes, I disagree that it is slave labor. Slave labor does exist in some places, but the majority of workers in developing countries work there voluntarily.</p>
<p>To many of them it represents the first real opportunity for economic gain in generations if not millenia. I am not so presumptive as to impose our standards of economic life on another country. Each country will develop according to what it sees as the best way. I can still remember the days when Made In Japan was a pejorative term and I am sure workers there were making the equivalent of “pennies on the dollar”. Not every one gets to start out as an Ibanker. Ask some native Chinese how they feel about things and get back to me. Meanwhile you can read The Good Earth to get a picture of the good ole days in China. That “cheap junk” is feeding and clothing millions of people who did not enjoy those basic goods a few short years ago.
People with your sort of thinking is what keeps people in real poverty with no hope for better days ahead.</p>
<p>Well, to be fair barrons, a lot of what keeps many people in developing nations in poverty is the repressive policy handed down from the IMF and World Bank, in the form of structural adjustment programs and the like.</p>
<p>What’s your solution? Is it to not buy Chinese goods? If so, then those workers will move from the $0.60/hr (or whatever) to $0/hr. Now what? They’re not better off. Is it to somehow pay the same price as one would pay if it were manufactured in the USA? If so, then it wouldn’t be built in China in the first place and they’d still be out of work. </p>
<p>The Chinese are doing what developing economies do - they work for supply and demand and as more and more manufacturing and jobs move there the wages will increase along with their livelihood.</p>
<p>And, ‘slave labor’ only applies if people are being forced to work in the particular environment - i.e. someone will kill or imprison them if they don’t. I don’t think this is the case for the majority of the Chinese workers any more.</p>
<p>Thanks for your idiotic patronizing tone, Barrons. Since you have no idea what my knowledge or experience of developing nations is, I will still put your comments in the bogus category, along with your knowledge of real estate prices and trends in areas of the country in which you don’t live.</p>
<p>With all but a few chemical manufacturing positions outsorced to China, should we ban all imports of Chinese-made chemicals or should we implement stricter controls?</p>
<p>Allmusic, My knowledge of prices around the country comes from the same sources typically used by the major newspapers and magazines. The widely cited Economy.com to which I have subscription access, NAR data, etc which is more reliable than your anecdotal data about your neighbor in one price range in one suburb of one city in a region.</p>