Question

All Sections 7. As demonstrated in the film True Cost, some economists argue that conditions in garment factories, bad as they may be, are better opportunities for workers in "developing countries than they would have otherwise. After watching this film, do you buy this argument? Even if the argument is true, does that mean that conditions should not be improved? How are women's rights particularly affected?

Answer 1

This is a subjective question. The economic problem of every country whether developing or not is optimal resource allocation. Sadly, optimality is a utopian concept. It is however true that the conditions of garment workers in many parts of the developing world is bad, even then textile and garment production are lucrative sources of the many unemployed working population in these countries. An ideal trajectory of economic growth and development is the transitions from agriculture to moving resources to the manufacturing sector and then the services. As easy as in theory, it is exactly this allocation of human resources from one sector to another often fails to materialise. We must understand that resource allocation problem in a developing country is far more intense than in a developed country. The garment sector has the capacity to employ more semi-skilled workers than services or agriculture. This is because in less income countries, skilled labour is scarce. The skilled labour is almost entirely employed in the service sector leaving behind massive population who are semi-skilled or unskilled. Agriculture exhausts its capacity to employ any more workers. The garment sector then, which can undertake the largest manufacturing provides employment options. This is because garment sectors still has many tasks done manually. In many developing countries, rural women are employed to wove cloth, dye, spin etc. This is vastly increased the employment of women.

Even with the tiny jobs, the little extra income does not hurt the families in the developing countries who would otherwise be unemployed. These 'employed' women are often at the bottom rung of the production chain fetching wages lower than their male counterparts. The companies who hire them often have no knowledge of the conditions and terms of work. In most garment factories, women are assigned monotonous tasks with low specification and skills. The heavy lifting and jobs on machines are given to men. The condition of workers should be improved, yes, and it is on the part of legislature and government to monitor these issues. Despite such conditions however, people in developing countries barely raise their voices. Because it is better to earn little than nothing at all.