Trade agreement not only bad for U.S. workers

Just who would a Thailand Free Trade Agreement (FTA) be good for? It’s bad for American autoworkers, and Thai workers and farmers don’t like the idea either.

Nearly 10,000 Thai protesters disrupted FTA talks scheduled Jan. 9-13 in Chiang Mai, Thailand, forcing negotiators in midweek to move to a new location.

Thai workers fear a trade agreement would hurt farmers by flooding the market with cheap foreign produce, raise the cost of generic drugs, privatize public utilities and give U.S. corporations unfettered access to the Thai market.

That same week 15 labor unions and federations sent a letter to President Bush urging him to “stop the FTA negotiations since Thai workers have not participated in the process.”

The letter to Bush emphasizes the lack of occupational health and safety enforcement in Thailand, labor rights violations by employers going unpunished and noncompliance with International Labor Organization standards.

Makers of light trucks have flocked to Thailand. A Thai FTA would drop tariffs and could flood the United States with vehicles threatening the jobs of 90,000 UAW members who assemble light trucks or build parts for them.

“In order for there to be fair trade, workers need to be represented at the negotiating table,” said UAW President Ron Gettelfinger. “When there are no enforceable worker rights included in these agreements, workers everywhere suffer.”

Even members of Thailand’s Congress oppose the talks saying the process is unconstitutional. They are challenging an already-signed Thailand-Australia FTA for the same reason.

FTA negotiators made little progress in the Chiang Mai talks. The next round of negotiations is expected to take place soon in the United States.

Larry Gabriel

BRIEFS

It’s high time for New Balance to do the right thing

Workers making New Balance sneakers at the Hongyuan Shoe factory in China earn 41 cents an hour and are forced to work grueling 14- to 15-hour shifts, six and seven days a week, without regularly scheduled days off.

On top of being cheated of their legal overtime pay, workers are fined 1.5 hours wages for each minute they are late.

Workers are housed in primitive, crowded dorm rooms, sleeping in triple-level bunk beds. Women workers must shower in front of men.

The sickening smell of plastic fumes hangs heavy in the factory air.

In some departments, the noise level is so high workers have to shout and gesture to be understood.

Workers say factory food is so awful they have to force themselves to swallow it – including rice contaminated with rat feces. Workers must pay for the water they drink in the factory.

Meanwhile, New Balance CEO Jim Davis is only 198th on the Forbes magazine list of 400 Richest Americans, no doubt struggling to get by on his net worth of $1.6 billion.

Isn’t it time for New Balance to do the right thing?

Can’t Wal-Mart afford this?

Some bargains aren’t worth the human misery behind them.

An undercover investigation by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.’s (CBC) “Zone Libre” program in December found children ages 10 to 13 sewing blue “I love my Wal-Mart” shirts in several Bangladesh factories.

The children, who also sew Wal-Mart’s Simply Basic private label, were paid less than 10 cents an hour and forced to work long hours in dimly lit and dirty conditions.

When caught, Wal-Mart feigned shock and outrage that its code of conduct had been violated. The company announced it would pull its work out of the factories that the CBC exposed. This was the worst thing Wal-Mart could have done.

It just further punishes the very kids Wal-Mart was exploiting.

The right thing to do – the moral thing – would be for Wal-Mart to keep its production in these factories while working with its contractors to correct the abuses.

Wal-Mart should provide monthly stipends to the child laborers so that they can attend school. Children belong in school, not in sweatshops.

Surely the largest corporation in the world can afford to do this.

Sources: The National Labor Committee and China Labor Watch