The Incomplete Cynic

You may be accomplishing the opposite of what you intend.

The same applies to so-called sweatshop-free products. I’m for free trade, but trade means you get the lowest price, and that might mean you buy something from what some people call a sweatshop. The name itself conveys abuse.

Henderson says that’s wrong. The workers aren’t abused.

“In fact, they’re better off taking those jobs. … The mistake Americans make is they think they would never work in a sweatshop and therefore they say these people shouldn’t. Well, no one’s offering those people green cards. Those people are stuck in those countries. They’re choosing their best of a bunch of bad options. And when you take away someone’s best of a bad option, they’re worse off.”

That happened after Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa complained about sweatshops in Bangladesh. Some shops closed. Then Oxfam discovered that kids who were laid off often turned to prostitution to support themselves.