3 ms·

Fair trade is a first World scam. What fair trade does is mandate the price of certain commodities. This in effect negates the biggest advantage of developing

by w00pla 17y ago

Fair trade is a first World scam. What fair trade does is mandate the price of certain commodities. This in effect negates the biggest advantage of developing countries (cheap labour) and allows the products to be manufactured in developed countries at a "fair" price. Fair trade, along with agricultural subsidization is some of the most evil things that developed countries do.

snan 17y ago
I wouldn’t be so quick in lumping these two (fair trade labeling vs agricultural subsidization) together. I agree that fairtrade has problems. However, I see merit to the idea to inform consumers about the background of certain products (information is vital to market economy, right?). Fairtrade certification doesn’t just mean “fair” prices but also some restrictions on slave labor, the right to unionize, and conservation of the environment and some other network externalities. Product labeling is a classic direct action tactic and I think it’s a great way to concisely provide information that would otherwise be obscure. This is not a subsidy and it’s not a tariff. It’s (an attempt at) providing information.
ilkhd2 17y ago
Do not like it - do not buy, goddamnit. If you think that people who buy Fair Trade are stupid - no we are not, and we are doing for a reason - we do not feel good when consume something made by slaves. You can still shop for "free trade" stuff, nobody prevents you from doing that.
- whughes 17y ago
  He didn't say you were just stupid, or that you were wasting your money. He said fair trade was evil. That means it's not so easy as saying "if you don't like it, don't buy it." Ignoring evil is not good, even if other people are doing the evil. "If you don't like murder, don't murder people" won't stop other people from committing murders. You're free to have your own opinion on whether fair trade actually is evil, but please address his point rather than ignoring it.
  - eru 17y ago
    With a bit of goodwill, you can read the ilkhd's comment as: If all participants are in there voluntarily, it can't be evil; and you are free to ignore it. I do not like the `fairtrade' stuff for the same reasons as w00pla, but since nobody's forced to participate (as opposed to agricultural subsidies and tariffs), I do not mind other people engaging in this. Fair trade is free trade where people in the developed world choose to pay the produces to pay them for certain strange things. E.g. as a fairtrade producer you can not employ day labourers. (At least that's what I heard. But I do not remember the source.) And genetically modified plants are banned, too. (http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/includes/documents/cm_docs/2008/f/fairtrade_gm_q_a_jan_08.pdf http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/includes/documents/cm_docs/2008/...) I can image myself paying more for stuff that gets produced in nice working conditions and does not damage the environment. But I'd actually prefer to see more GM and I do not mind day labourers. Perhaps one could create an alternative to `fairtrade' where you can combine your own building blocks of stuff you want to pay extra for?
    - snan 17y ago
      Right, even hough that’s a bit of a simplification. It’s not necessarily “paying more”, looking at the clarified conditions as services (even though of course there’s overhead, and possibility of corruption, in the labeling and certification process). Imaging some item, let’s say jeans. You can get just jeans from company A, with an unknown profit margin or middlemen, or you can get jeans from company B together with information and conditions on production. If these conditions were a service you were charged explicitly for, of course the company B jeans would be more expensive than the ones from company A. That’s not necessarily the case, however, since there might be unknown expenses for the consumer involved with company A (like, say, higher profit margins). Or, for that matter, the jeans from company A could be every bit as “fairly” produced, just you don’t know about it. Nothing says that the labeled (“B” in the example) ones would be more expensive, disregarding the labelling/certification overhead.
rthj 17y ago
Ok, so a coop or factory in a "3rd world" country needs to pay around $5k to a European organization to get this certification for this Fairtrade thing. It seems to me this just continues the racist attitude North America and Europe have toward certain countries. I'm sure not every factory or coop in the "3rd world" takes advantage of its workers. Maybe the "3rd world" should come up with some type of similar program for U.S. farmers to prove they didn't exploit migrant farm workers. I won't even go into all the stupid problems that occur when you create an artificial floor price for a product.

by w00pla 17y ago

snan 17y ago

I wouldn’t be so quick in lumping these two (fair trade labeling vs agricultural subsidization) together. I agree that fairtrade has problems. However, I see merit to the idea to inform consumers about the background of certain products (information is vital to market economy, right?). Fairtrade certification doesn’t just mean “fair” prices but also some restrictions on slave labor, the right to unionize, and conservation of the environment and some other network externalities. Product labeling is a classic direct action tactic and I think it’s a great way to concisely provide information that would otherwise be obscure. This is not a subsidy and it’s not a tariff. It’s (an attempt at) providing information.

ilkhd2 17y ago

Do not like it - do not buy, goddamnit. If you think that people who buy Fair Trade are stupid - no we are not, and we are doing for a reason - we do not feel good when consume something made by slaves. You can still shop for "free trade" stuff, nobody prevents you from doing that.

whughes 17y ago
He didn't say you were just stupid, or that you were wasting your money. He said fair trade was evil. That means it's not so easy as saying "if you don't like it, don't buy it." Ignoring evil is not good, even if other people are doing the evil. "If you don't like murder, don't murder people" won't stop other people from committing murders. You're free to have your own opinion on whether fair trade actually is evil, but please address his point rather than ignoring it.
- eru 17y ago
  With a bit of goodwill, you can read the ilkhd's comment as: If all participants are in there voluntarily, it can't be evil; and you are free to ignore it. I do not like the `fairtrade' stuff for the same reasons as w00pla, but since nobody's forced to participate (as opposed to agricultural subsidies and tariffs), I do not mind other people engaging in this. Fair trade is free trade where people in the developed world choose to pay the produces to pay them for certain strange things. E.g. as a fairtrade producer you can not employ day labourers. (At least that's what I heard. But I do not remember the source.) And genetically modified plants are banned, too. (http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/includes/documents/cm_docs/2008/f/fairtrade_gm_q_a_jan_08.pdf http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/includes/documents/cm_docs/2008/...) I can image myself paying more for stuff that gets produced in nice working conditions and does not damage the environment. But I'd actually prefer to see more GM and I do not mind day labourers. Perhaps one could create an alternative to `fairtrade' where you can combine your own building blocks of stuff you want to pay extra for?
  - snan 17y ago
    Right, even hough that’s a bit of a simplification. It’s not necessarily “paying more”, looking at the clarified conditions as services (even though of course there’s overhead, and possibility of corruption, in the labeling and certification process). Imaging some item, let’s say jeans. You can get just jeans from company A, with an unknown profit margin or middlemen, or you can get jeans from company B together with information and conditions on production. If these conditions were a service you were charged explicitly for, of course the company B jeans would be more expensive than the ones from company A. That’s not necessarily the case, however, since there might be unknown expenses for the consumer involved with company A (like, say, higher profit margins). Or, for that matter, the jeans from company A could be every bit as “fairly” produced, just you don’t know about it. Nothing says that the labeled (“B” in the example) ones would be more expensive, disregarding the labelling/certification overhead.

rthj 17y ago

Ok, so a coop or factory in a "3rd world" country needs to pay around $5k to a European organization to get this certification for this Fairtrade thing. It seems to me this just continues the racist attitude North America and Europe have toward certain countries. I'm sure not every factory or coop in the "3rd world" takes advantage of its workers. Maybe the "3rd world" should come up with some type of similar program for U.S. farmers to prove they didn't exploit migrant farm workers. I won't even go into all the stupid problems that occur when you create an artificial floor price for a product.