The Bad Old Days...

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by glatt

I know that economics can make a person desperate, but what the fuck? If the workers knew there were severe cracks, why did they enter the building? Aren't there other shitty garment jobs they can get in buildings without cracks?

You live in a slum.
Your living quarters are made of what you can beg, borrow or steal.
You have no power, no sanitation.
What you bring home is barely enough to feed your family.
You probably already walk long distances to work, because well financed places don't want to be cheek by jowl with the filth of their workers.

This is why people in the Western world call "exploitation", because there is no choice. Because people want to work to save their family from starving. Because people want to work.

And even then, slums are regularly bulldozed. People are hounded out, made to leave behind all they own (cooking pots and charcoal and bedding). The police know they will come back, but they also know they stand the chance of losing their precarious employment. If a houseboy doesn't turn up one day, if a busboy "loses" his uniform, there are plenty others to take his place.

Yes, Zen, bad things happen everywhere (and I know you weren't dismissing the issues in the thread.)
But badder things happen when money is more important than people. And isn't it always? And hasn't it always been?

[xoxoxoBruce]

Only special people can make money, but any old hoi polloi can make people.

[glatt]

the disaster again underscored the unsafe conditions in Bangladesh's massive garment industry

Presumably only one building had huge cracks that were so big the news reporters came out to report on them. If the industry is a massive one, there have to be lots of shitty jobs at other factories that, while they may be horrible places to work, don't have massive cracks.

I did see a report that said many people were forced to stay in the building, but I don't know what "forced" means. Were they held at gun point? Were they told that they would lose their jobs? Big difference between those two.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Doesn't matter if there's a million jobs, if there's two million workers.
In situations like that, blackballing becomes common. Not show up for work, you lose your job, and "you'll never work in this town again".

[glatt]

Yeah, I guess the unemployment rate is a better indicator than the size of an industry. And the idea of blacklisting someone seems so foreign to me since around here a company could be sued into oblivion if it could be proved that they blacklisted someone. That's why many companies won't even give references.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by glatt

I did see a report that said many people were forced to stay in the building, but I don't know what "forced" means. Were they held at gun point? Were they told that they would lose their jobs? Big difference between those two.

What Bruce said and what you said.
And the fact that in truth losing your job and risking your life... no question what will win.

Because your life is only you, and your family might get sympathy, payout and help if you die.
With you alive and unemployed you'll all just starve together.