Sweatshop Labor: Wearing Thin Essay example -- essays research papers

For most people in the United States, the term slave to modal value relates to anindividuals desire always to be wearing the present-day(prenominal) fashions from trendy c atomic reactorhing declinations. Ina twist of supreme irony, the designation applies much more(prenominal) literally to the legions ofpoverty-stricken sweatshop perseveranceers worldwide who toil apart under miserable conditionsto produce the snappy apparel that Americans purchase in droves on a daily basis.Conditioned by a media that places considerable emphasis on possessing a stylishwardrobe, the majority of U.S. consumers are outlying(prenominal) too awash in their own culture -- onethat is ill-famed for the value it places on material wealth -- to be sensitive to the affianceof these indigent unusualers. And although the US medias fleeting scrutiny of sweatshopconditions five old age ago did afford the issue a greater part of the bailiwick consciousnessthan ever before, not replete people cha nged their buying habits as a result -- or at leastnot abundant to make a dent in the all-important bottom line of guilty corporations. Indeed,major American retailers of clothing and other apparel products thrust not changed thisdespotic element of their business practices in the least despite the negative publicity infact, they continue to exploit laborers in foreign, mostly Third-World countries to analarming degree. The scope of the problem is such that hundreds of residents in a town as small andisolated as Santa Cruz have at nigh point been employed in sweatshops in impoverishednations. Santa Cruz resident Lorenzo Hernandez endured years of mistreatment at aDoall Enterprises factory in El Salvador before immigrating with his married woman and two sons toSanta Cruz in September, 2000. He now works full-time as a cook at Tony and AlbasPizza in Scotts Valley, and plot he scarcely earns above minimum wage in his currentposition, it represents a substantial improvement to t he abject conditions under which he intemperate for so many years in his home country. They treated us very badly (in ElSalvador), Hernandez said. I earned not enough to live on. My family could only buytwo shirts and pants (per person), and we were always hungry. I worked 14, 16 hours aday but still did not make enough. Hernandez speaks and moves with the languor of a man... ...ation or escape in religion. Fittingly, while more affluent people in the United States disregard the reality ofsweatshop labor because they are preoccupied with trying to sport cutting-edge fashions,the people of Ciudad Juarez attempt to disguise their realities because they are so painful. Faced with such unsettling tales of human suffering, Saganovich ashes resoluteWal-Mart is simply looking out for its best interests, and this alleged mistreatment offoreign laborers isnt anywhere near as bad as a lot of people make it out to be. Thepeople who are speech out so strongly against us are little more than a type ofpropagandists with their own agendas. Nobody forces anyone to work anywhere, and alot of them are coming to America and making better lives for themselves.Hernandez is one of a relatively small number of lucky immigrants who haverealized a greater level of wealth and comfort in the States, but he will never forget theanguish his previous jobs brought him and his compatriots. Its great, I can affordclothes and food here now, he said. only I try to buy from stores (that) dont havesweatshops.