Human Rights Advocates Should Be Improved Labor Conditions

As horrifying as it is to think about, comparisons can be made between the situations of current workers in third-world countries and the plight of the African slaves in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In many of the current poverty-stricken places seen around the globe, sweatshops are developed in order to employ laborers. Sweatshops are described as places of abysmal working conditions with low pay and tedious hours. In the article, "Black People in a White People's Country," Gary Nash notes that the African slave trade was originally developed to "fill labor shortages in the economies of its European initiators and their commercial partners." This description is similar to the motive behind the employment of third-world sweatshop workers. Both systems, ancient and modern, include the need for more laborers and disregard the vital needs of their employees/slaves as long as the work is getting done. Workers are harmfully exploited in both

Sweatshops have been around for centuries, beginning around the late 1880’s. Sweatshops are classified by three main components, long work hours, very low pay and unsafe and unhealthy working environments. Sweatshops are usually found in manufacturing industries and the most highlighted production is clothing corporations, who take full advantage of the low production costs of their products. Many may think sweatshops are a thing of the past but they are still affecting many lives across the nations. There are many ways sweatshops affect lives, but a recent article titled “New study finds ‘more sweatshops than Starbucks’ in Chicago” explains that there are many low wage industry jobs that are violating labor laws in the United States alone. The article also reports how employees who are working in such conditions won’t speak up in fear of the retaliation employers will implement. Analyzing Sweatshops through the lens of the Sociological perspectives will help us better understand the illegal conditions of workplaces that still exist today.

A majority of the clothing worn and purchased today in the United States has been manufactured overseas in sweatshops. Since the beginning of factories and businesses, owners have always looked for a way to cut production costs while still managing to produce large quantities of their product. It was found that the best way to cut costs was to utilize cheap labor in factories known as sweatshops. According to the US General Account Office, sweatshops are defined as a “business that regularly violates both wage or child labor and safety or health laws”. These sweatshops exploit their workers in various ways: making them work long hours in dangerous working conditions for little to no pay. Personally, I believe that the come up and employment of these sweatshops is unethical, but through my research I plan to find out if these shops produce more positive than negatives by giving these people in need a job despite the rough conditions.

Time and time again, there have been opposing views on just about every single possible topic one could fathom. From the most politically controversial topics of gun control and stem cell research to the more mundane transparent ones of brown or white rice and hat or no hat—it continues. Sweatshops and the controversy surrounding them is one that is unable to be put into simplistic terms, for sweatshops themselves are complex. The grand debate of opposing views in regards to sweatshops continues between two writers who both make convincing arguments as to why and how sweatshops should or should not be dealt with. In Sweat, Fire and Ethics, by Bob Jeffcott, he argues that more people ought to worry less about the outer layers of sweatshops and delve deeper into the real reason they exist and the unnecessariness of them. In contrast, Jeffrey D. Sachs writes of the urgent requirement of sweatshops needed during the industrialization time in a developing country, in his article of Bangladesh: On the Ladder of Development. The question is then asked: How do sweatshops positively and negatively affect people here in the United States of America and in other countries around the world?

Bob Jeffcott supports the effort of workers of the global supply chains in order to win improved wages and good working conditions and a better quality of life of those who work on sweatshops. He mentions and describes in detail how the conditions of the sweatshops are and how the people working in them are forced to long working hours for little money. He makes the question, “we think we can end sweatshops abuses by just changing our

When asked about the working condition in sweatshops, business advocates say that even though wages and work conditions may look mediocre by the standard developed nations,

In the essay “Sweatshop Oppression”, the writer, Rajeev Ravisankar begins his essay by building a connection with the audience by establishing common ground when he states, “being the “poor” college students that we all are” (Ravisankar, 2006). The problem he identifies is the significantly poor working conditions and slave labor wages that are often the price for cheaper goods from large renowned companies. Ravisankar assumes his readers are college students, and unaware of the reality of and often destitute conditions of these sweatshops. His goal is to not only bring awareness to the reality of sweatshop oppression, but how others, such as USAS have stepped up to bring change, and what

"Teens in Sweatshops." Junior Scholastic, vol. 106, no. 8, 24 Nov. 2003, p. 8. EBSCOhost,cucproxy.cuchicago.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=cookie,ip,cpid&custid=s8419239&db=prh&AN=11430419&site=ehost-live. This article focuses on teenagers that work in sweatshops, specifically in the United States. The article contains personal interviews and examples from real teens that were most likely immigrant workers working in sweatshops. The article describes events of a variety of different people working in different sweatshops and the effect it had on them. There are direct quotes from not only workers from sweatshops but also from workers in corporate companies speaking about their side on sweatshops. With statistics and facts being used in the article important information can easily be read through and understood. The article is important because it easily sums up sweatshops from what they are to what they do and how it affects others. With the article being so small and easy to read people with varying reading levels can read the information being presented and know about the abuse that is happening. Moving accounts from people and specific names of popular clothing stores serve as important details that impact a reader’s opinion on

Around the world are factories that take advantage of the less fortunate and those desperate for a job. These places, called sweatshops, did not come into existence recently, but they had existed in the past as well. A sweatshop is “a work place, often a factory, in which employees work long hours at low wages under poor conditions”. In sweatshops, workers are not given employee benefits or a living wage. However, sweatshops were most common in the United States during the Industrial Revolution, throughout the years 1880 through 1920.

As readers judge the article by its title, they see significance of it and see the author trying to convince the audience that sweatshops are ineffective. Bob Jeffcott, wrote and published “Sweat, Fire and Ethics,” in which he argues that citizenship is more likely to get rid of rather than shopping. Jeffcott’s purpose is to convey the poor working conditions of factories that ends in death of hundreds in which, no one is doing much to end them. Moreover, he describes what is really taking place in the manufacturing industries as well as what it actually mean to us consumers. In “Sweat, Fire and Ethics,” Bob Jeffcott effectively argues his opinions as to what should be done to protect unethical working conditions.

Nicholas D Kristof begins his essay by exploring the ideas that factory jobs in poor countries are actually a means of reduce poverty. As noted in his article, “sweatshops are only a symptom of poverty, not a cause” (paragraph 8, pge 110). Although sweatshop may be harsh, present a better alternative for workers for in poor countries than what is already available to them. The problem he identifies in his article is the fact that many families would rather work at a sweatshop than stay in a dangerous garbage dumps, searching for something to recycle for a change (Kristof). He assumes that his readers know little about sweatshops; furthermore, how difficult and awful the living conditions are. He goes on to say that some of those workers have

Sweatshops have been a popular and serviceable “business,” although there are a lot of controversy on whether sweatshops should be banned and hows pay wages should be higher. Many people believe that sweatshops are unfair, cruel and unlawful, whereas others think that sweatshops are a second chance for many people living in developing countries. The dictionary definition of a sweatshop is factory or workshop, especially in the clothing industry, where manual workers are employed at very low wages for long hours and under poor conditions, it is defined by the US Department of Labor as a factory that violates 2 or more labor laws. Sweatshops are a frequent ordeal in many countries, all over the globe, with a variety of perspectives.

A sweatshop is a workplace that violates the law and where workers are subject to extreme exploitation (including the absence of a living wage or long work hours), poor working conditions such as health and safety hazards, arbitrary discipline such as verbal or physical discipline or fear and intimidation when they attempt to stand up for their rights or attempt to form a union.1 This paper explores the working conditions in sweatshops mainly located near the US-Mexican border and the results the production of sweatshops have caused. US companies import American parts into Mexico to assemble the parts in ‘maquiladoras’. Maquiladoras are best described as assembly plants run by foreign-based multinational corporations, most of which are headquartered in the United States and export the products back to the United States. The produced goods are then usually stamped ‘Assembled in Mexico or US Materials’.2

Abstract: Many countries, industries and people are becoming more affected by sweatshops in different ways because of they’re continuous increase in growth. Sweatshops benefit many developing countries as they provide opportunities of employment to the people living in poverty and benefit the community at large by creating an economic infrastructure that utilizes the country’s resources and increases their tax base. These institutions first came into existence in the early 1800’s and were referred to as dwelling houses, which were local factories that generally had the same idea of the sweatshop that we have in today’s society. There

Companies try and pass it down the supply chain to until it reaches those who cannot pass it down any more. The people making these clothes are the most vulnerable, those who have no voice, there are garment factory workers in Bangladesh, China, Cambodia, cotton farmers in India and the child slaves working in cotton farms in Uzbekistan. Some sweatshop workers speak out on their experience. A young woman named Aracerly talks about her experience working in a sweatshop. She works on her feet for more than 12 hours a day getting payed 80 dollars weekly. Her palms are calloused and has burn marks that were not treated properly in the sewing shops. She is exposed to poisonous elements and using unsafe equipment without suitable protection. Most people working in sweat shops are forced to work in the farms and factories that produce the imputes for our clothing in the industry. Their wages are so low that they are unable to lift themselves or their families out of poverty, and the cycle continues.