by Michael Padbury

Created on: March 01, 2007   Last Updated: April 19, 2007

Many of us pity foreign "sweatshop" workers. We hear about people living in Third-world countries who work exceedingly long hours for a two dollar a day wage. And do you know what the problem with sweatshops is? There aren't enough of them.
Now I am now a particularly evil individual. I don't eat babies for breakfast or kick puppies for fun. I am however a realistic, and understand the economical importance of sweatshops. Sweatshops are dirty, unsafe factories with working conditions that make me cringe by my Western standards. Those same standards allow me to make the same amount pouring coffee at my local coffee shop for a couple hours as a Honduran apparel worker make in a whole day of work. It's obvious that it is unfair to compare our Western standards with the developing economies of these third-world nations.

It may seem like my beliefs are radical, however if you are knowledgeable in economics I doubt you'll still have that opinion. I'll clarify who also shares my beliefs. Jeffery Sachs (the only academic to have been repeatedly among the world's most influential people by Time Magazine), Pulitzer prize-winning journalists Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl Wudunn, Michael Walker (President and Founder of the Fraser Institute), and Johan Norberg (author of In Defence of Global Capitalism). Actually "the overwhelming mainstream view among economists is the growth of this kind of employment [sweatshop] is tremendous good news for the world's poor," MIT's Paul Krugman explains.

Some others have said notably, fellow Helium writer Max Benson that they take away jobs from the American man. Firstly, it seems ironic that the American man is the victim here... America is a developed nation that enjoys affluence only dreamed about by the Third World. Secondly, America had sweatshops and child labor. America used these tools to develop economically and now they are complaining about other nations using them. I guess if Max Benson represents the American man, he is a hypocrite. Thirdly, yes sweatshop workers do take jobs away from the American man. Coincidentally all non-American workers do. I live in a Canadian city where there are a large amount of automotive workers who are employed by the Big 3. These jobs could be filled by Americans if operations were moved. Sweatshop take away jobs from the "American man" because they do the work more efficiently. Also the "American man" benefits from the savings through the use of sweatshops. I'm sure all Americans have benefited

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