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Can anyone shed some light on this paragraph? > The global supply chains, with their mega-scale engineering projects and infrastructures, exist primarily becau

Can anyone shed some light on this paragraph? > The global supply chains, with their mega-scale engineering projects and infrastructures, exist primarily because global wealth inequality makes it cheap to have stuff made in certain countries — even when you have to ship it halfway across the globe to sell it for a profit. By leveraging stark gaps in wages and standards of living as efficiently as it can, the supply chain network is actively enforcing that global inequality. I understand how wealth inequality is leveraged, and that it's in shipping companies financial interest to have highest margins, which doesn't really help the inequality. Still, it doesn't follow that they are actively enforcing inequality (they are after all flowing the capital toward poorer parts of world). If they are, which mechanisms are being used?

johnmaguire2013 6y ago
If I have you produce 100 widgets at $0.10/widget, and then ship each widget for $0.20/widget, and then sell each widget for $1.00, but Amazon takes a 30% cut... - The shipping company received 2x what the producer received - Amazon received 3x what the producer received - I profited 4x what the producer received So some capital is flowing to the poorer producers, but not nearly as much as is flowing to every single other person in the supply chain. And if the amount flowing to the producer is only the bare minimum required to live...
vladTheInhaler 6y ago
Who specifically has control of that capital? I'd be willing to hazard a guess that it's not the Bangladeshi textile workers or Congolese miners. And meanwhile the real, tangible wealth is leaving their countries in shipping containers. So on balance, a bunch of resources (labor, fossil fuels, raw materials) are being expended in order to transport valuable goods from a poor place to a rich place. And in exchange a couple of bits were flipped in an account belonging to a local power broker. Hard to see how that does anything other than further impoverish the "client" nation. And all the companies involved are incentivized to perpetuate the status quo, in order to maintain access to cheap labor and natural resources. And we have seen that historically they are more than willing to undermine countries that are threatening their profits [1] [2] [3]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9ta... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_King...

johnmaguire2013 6y ago

If I have you produce 100 widgets at $0.10/widget, and then ship each widget for $0.20/widget, and then sell each widget for $1.00, but Amazon takes a 30% cut... - The shipping company received 2x what the producer received - Amazon received 3x what the producer received - I profited 4x what the producer received So some capital is flowing to the poorer producers, but not nearly as much as is flowing to every single other person in the supply chain. And if the amount flowing to the producer is only the bare minimum required to live...

vladTheInhaler 6y ago

Who specifically has control of that capital? I'd be willing to hazard a guess that it's not the Bangladeshi textile workers or Congolese miners. And meanwhile the real, tangible wealth is leaving their countries in shipping containers. So on balance, a bunch of resources (labor, fossil fuels, raw materials) are being expended in order to transport valuable goods from a poor place to a rich place. And in exchange a couple of bits were flipped in an account belonging to a local power broker. Hard to see how that does anything other than further impoverish the "client" nation. And all the companies involved are incentivized to perpetuate the status quo, in order to maintain access to cheap labor and natural resources. And we have seen that historically they are more than willing to undermine countries that are threatening their profits [1] [2] [3]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9ta... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_King...