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Realistically, if you improve working conditions or pay in Bangladesh, the business will shift to one of 10 other poor countries in the developing world. That's

Realistically, if you improve working conditions or pay in Bangladesh, the business will shift to one of 10 other poor countries in the developing world. That's not to say we should give up trying to do that. But the comparison of the low-skilled labour with scarce developers, is simply not a very good one, because most developers have reasonable bargaining power.

CuriouslyC 6y ago
The answer is to impose environmental and labor based tariffs on countries that enable destructive capitalism, so the cost savings from disregarding the environment and human suffering is offset. Free trade should only be a thing between ethical, responsible states.
- speleding 6y ago
  That well intended argument has frequently been used as a protectionist argument to keep out cheaper goods from developing nations. E.g. the EU doesn't allow certain produce from Africa because of these reasons. Most African countries simply won't be able to comply, and the sad thing is that trading produce with the west is one of the only ways for them to escape poverty. So the people you aim to protect are left worse off.
  - CuriouslyC 6y ago
    History says that aid to corrupt governments to help the suffering there mostly ends up in the pockets of the people in power, so I'm frankly okay with that. When they get their act together, they can be welcomed into the fold.
    - speleding 6y ago
      Trade is generally accepted as one of the best ways to relieve poverty, precisely because money ends up close to the workers instead of with corrupt governments.
      - runarberg 6y ago
        Generally accepted does not equate to the one true way, and in fact, when people generally accept something to be the only truth they usually turn out to be wrong. Economic theory being as contested as it is, and how demonstrably inefficient current economic theories have been at lifting people out of poverty, I would not be surprised if history will regard the statement of “trade is one of the best ways to relieve poverty” to be a failure. And even if the statement is true, this statement might not hold with international trade as it does with local trade. Perhaps if local populations were allowed to trade freely among them self would be a superior option, then if the rich west were constantly under bidding and under paying. To take an example. Angola trades a lot with rich countries (particularly with China), yet Angola has one of the worst dictatorships in Southern Africa, and has one of the poorest working class. International trade does not seem to be helping in that case.
      - RestlessMind 6y ago
        The same argument was applied to China in 2000 that trade would transition them to democracy. Instead, we got both poverty eradication AND the entrenchment of their corrupt government in an even stronger position thanks to a stronger economy. I would be very reluctant to support trade with a despot regime.
        speleding 6y ago
        I think a billion people out of poverty is a net win. Even if their government hasn't become as democratic as we hoped, the chances of it eventually becoming more democratic aren't much less than 20 years ago. If you only want to do business with democratic regimes you will likely hurt the poor people at the bottom more than the despots in power.
        RestlessMind 6y ago
        > I think a billion people out of poverty is a net win. On the loss side, we have allowed this despot regime to amass so much power (thanks to the economic growth) that they can take the following steps with impunity 1. ethnic cleansing of Uighur minorities 2. support of a rogue nuclear regime in North Korea 3. Subjugating more than a billion people with perpetual surveillance and authoritarian rule 4. Increasing risks of a strife with multiple neighbors - Japan (Senkaku), S. Korea (via N. Korea), Taiwan (claiming sovereignty), Vietnam (South China Sea) etc. It feels like a net loss to me.
runarberg 6y ago
The tiny European country where I come from, the occupation classes with the seemingly most bargaining power are nurses, teachers, air stewards, as they seem to be striking every other year. At the same time they are still payed lower then other similar jobs with similar education requirements. I tend to think that their lower salaries can easier be attributed to the fact that these jobs are majority women. And there is still a significant gender gap in this country. I’m sorry to say, but I’m little skeptical on how much bargaining power explains different pay gaps.
- PeterisP 6y ago
  The situation you describe (striking every other year) is indicative of low bargaining power, as they have to resort to extreme measures and still don't get what professions with high bargaining power get offered even without negotiation. One cause of low bargaining power for this type of professions (characterised by low pay, relatively high education requirements, decent social status/respect, working with people, often majority female) is that in those positions "the market knows" that the strikers won't fulfil the only threat that matters, namely, simply abandoning that profession for a career path that pays more but is worse in other aspects (generally, unskilled or semi-skilled jobs with less social respectability and work conditions - e.g. painting jobs in construction, driving a garbage truck, etc; it generally would seem a downgrade for a teacher even with an increase in pay) and that theres a nontrivial niche of young people who are still intentionally studying for that profession despite knowing that the pay sucks, because they are motivated by factors other than money. The more people there are who are highly motivated to do that job for non-compensation reasons, the less bargaining power the whole profession has, and it is reflected in pay.
  - runarberg 6y ago
    See, this makes me think that the term “Bargaining power” is a post-hoc construction with a-priori explanatory power for salaries. Saying “People have higher salaries because they have more bargaining power” sounds to me like people stating that „courageous people score highly on the courageous personality factor“, or that “there are so many unmarried men because there are so many bachelors”. Or maybe low bargaining power is just another way to say easily exploitable in the current economic system. If that is the case I’ll subscribe to your theory, as a very similar theory was constructed by Karl Marx in 1867.

CuriouslyC 6y ago

The answer is to impose environmental and labor based tariffs on countries that enable destructive capitalism, so the cost savings from disregarding the environment and human suffering is offset. Free trade should only be a thing between ethical, responsible states.

speleding 6y ago
That well intended argument has frequently been used as a protectionist argument to keep out cheaper goods from developing nations. E.g. the EU doesn't allow certain produce from Africa because of these reasons. Most African countries simply won't be able to comply, and the sad thing is that trading produce with the west is one of the only ways for them to escape poverty. So the people you aim to protect are left worse off.
- CuriouslyC 6y ago
  History says that aid to corrupt governments to help the suffering there mostly ends up in the pockets of the people in power, so I'm frankly okay with that. When they get their act together, they can be welcomed into the fold.
  - speleding 6y ago
    Trade is generally accepted as one of the best ways to relieve poverty, precisely because money ends up close to the workers instead of with corrupt governments.
    - runarberg 6y ago
      Generally accepted does not equate to the one true way, and in fact, when people generally accept something to be the only truth they usually turn out to be wrong. Economic theory being as contested as it is, and how demonstrably inefficient current economic theories have been at lifting people out of poverty, I would not be surprised if history will regard the statement of “trade is one of the best ways to relieve poverty” to be a failure. And even if the statement is true, this statement might not hold with international trade as it does with local trade. Perhaps if local populations were allowed to trade freely among them self would be a superior option, then if the rich west were constantly under bidding and under paying. To take an example. Angola trades a lot with rich countries (particularly with China), yet Angola has one of the worst dictatorships in Southern Africa, and has one of the poorest working class. International trade does not seem to be helping in that case.
    - RestlessMind 6y ago
      The same argument was applied to China in 2000 that trade would transition them to democracy. Instead, we got both poverty eradication AND the entrenchment of their corrupt government in an even stronger position thanks to a stronger economy. I would be very reluctant to support trade with a despot regime.
      - speleding 6y ago
        I think a billion people out of poverty is a net win. Even if their government hasn't become as democratic as we hoped, the chances of it eventually becoming more democratic aren't much less than 20 years ago. If you only want to do business with democratic regimes you will likely hurt the poor people at the bottom more than the despots in power.
        RestlessMind 6y ago
        > I think a billion people out of poverty is a net win. On the loss side, we have allowed this despot regime to amass so much power (thanks to the economic growth) that they can take the following steps with impunity 1. ethnic cleansing of Uighur minorities 2. support of a rogue nuclear regime in North Korea 3. Subjugating more than a billion people with perpetual surveillance and authoritarian rule 4. Increasing risks of a strife with multiple neighbors - Japan (Senkaku), S. Korea (via N. Korea), Taiwan (claiming sovereignty), Vietnam (South China Sea) etc. It feels like a net loss to me.

runarberg 6y ago

The tiny European country where I come from, the occupation classes with the seemingly most bargaining power are nurses, teachers, air stewards, as they seem to be striking every other year. At the same time they are still payed lower then other similar jobs with similar education requirements. I tend to think that their lower salaries can easier be attributed to the fact that these jobs are majority women. And there is still a significant gender gap in this country. I’m sorry to say, but I’m little skeptical on how much bargaining power explains different pay gaps.

PeterisP 6y ago
The situation you describe (striking every other year) is indicative of low bargaining power, as they have to resort to extreme measures and still don't get what professions with high bargaining power get offered even without negotiation. One cause of low bargaining power for this type of professions (characterised by low pay, relatively high education requirements, decent social status/respect, working with people, often majority female) is that in those positions "the market knows" that the strikers won't fulfil the only threat that matters, namely, simply abandoning that profession for a career path that pays more but is worse in other aspects (generally, unskilled or semi-skilled jobs with less social respectability and work conditions - e.g. painting jobs in construction, driving a garbage truck, etc; it generally would seem a downgrade for a teacher even with an increase in pay) and that theres a nontrivial niche of young people who are still intentionally studying for that profession despite knowing that the pay sucks, because they are motivated by factors other than money. The more people there are who are highly motivated to do that job for non-compensation reasons, the less bargaining power the whole profession has, and it is reflected in pay.
- runarberg 6y ago
  See, this makes me think that the term “Bargaining power” is a post-hoc construction with a-priori explanatory power for salaries. Saying “People have higher salaries because they have more bargaining power” sounds to me like people stating that „courageous people score highly on the courageous personality factor“, or that “there are so many unmarried men because there are so many bachelors”. Or maybe low bargaining power is just another way to say easily exploitable in the current economic system. If that is the case I’ll subscribe to your theory, as a very similar theory was constructed by Karl Marx in 1867.