Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of
employment, to just and favourable conditions of work. . .Everyone
has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and
well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing,
housing and medical care and necessary social service. These are
excerpts from the Declaration of Human Rights. Written over 50 years
ago, the Declaration was created to give, inherent dignity
and. . .equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human
family. The Declaration gave hope to many people across the globe
who were living in tyranny and oppression, hoping for equality and
fair treatment. Unfortunately for some, this document turned out to
be merely one of false hope and lies. The people I speak of are our
fellow human beings working under slave-like conditions in
sweatshops. To them, the aforementioned promises are just a myth,
something they can only dream about. As the aforementioned articles
state, all human beings are guaranteed fair pay and working. Are not
those sweat shop workers human beings? Of course they are human
beings! Sadly, theyre not treated like it. Theyre forced to work
and incredible number of hours, under hazardous conditions and at
ridiculously low wages. Dont they deserve the rights the Declaration
mentions? Of course they do! This is the exact reason that such
treatment cant continue. Something must be done.
Although proponents of sweatshops say that consumer demand
for the lowest prices controls worker wages and conditions, they are
just fooling themselves. If they want to talk about it economically,
cheap labor actually debilitates the economy by driving wages down
and forcing the lack of money which can only lead to a recession. In
addition, workers who are paid less, are in turn less motivated to
work. In addition, as economist Hazel Henderson explains:
Many international manufacturers...