Sweatshops and Worker's Choice

Sweatshops

• Defined as factories or workshops employing manual laborers at very low wages, long hours, and with poor working conditions.
• Multinational enterprises using sweatshop labor are often criticized for:
  • Exploiting workers' vulnerability
  • Failing to respect workers as persons (Kantian)
  • Ignoring human rights abuses
  • Being complicit with repressive regimes by denying worker's rights and not enforcing minimum standards

Transformative Power of Choice

• Choice is an exercise of an agent's autonomy
• Even if not fully autonomous, it generates a strong claim of non-interference
• Choice expresses an agent's preferences
• Choosing to work at a sweatshop expresses a preference for that option, so removing it causes great harm
• Preferences of the coerced can still be morally significant (Mugging case)

The Argument: Two Arguments in One

• Most sweatshop workers' choice is an exercise of autonomy
• Taking away the sweatshop option will violate the workers' autonomy
• It is wrong to violate autonomy, all else equal
• Sweatshop workers' choice expresses their preference.
• Taking away the sweatshop option will probably harm the workers.
• It is wrong to harm people, all else equal
• Therefore, all things being equal, it is wrong to take away the sweatshop option from those who would choose it

The Argument In Full

• Sweatshop workers choose to accept their employment conditions, even if from a severely constrained set of options
• Choosing those conditions suggests they view it as their most-preferred option
• Viewing it as their most-preferred option indicates that removing that option will harm them
• Workers' choice is sufficiently autonomous, thus removing the option would violate their autonomy
• All else being equal, it is wrong to harm people or violate their autonomy
• Therefore, it is wrong to take away the option of sweatshop labor from workers who would choose it
• Premises 1-4 are empirical assumptions that can be challenged

Clarifications

• The argument does not take a stance on whether sweatshops themselves are morally good or bad
• It acknowledges many activities in sweatshops are immoral and should change
• Sometimes, interference can be justified, especially if the wrongs of violating workers' autonomy can be morally justified in specific circumstances.

Policy Implications

• Legal bans on sweatshops and sweatshop-produced goods are wrong
• Regulations that aim to ameliorate working conditions in sweatshops are similarly wrong

Objection & Reply: Failure of Voluntariness

• Objection: workers are coerced by dire economic circumstances/are ignorant or not fully rational
• Responses:
  • Coercion doesn't always justify ignoring stated preferences
  • Coercion is bad because it reduces options; removing the best option is a further form of coercion
  • Some workers may be ignorant/irrational, but that doesn't mean the option should be removed for all
  • Even if all are ignorant/irrational, removing the sweatshop option isn't necessarily the best solution

Questions

• Do minimum wage/maximum hour laws necessarily remove options from workers?
• Even if these regulations lead to decline of employment and harm to workers, do the benefits of more regulation outweigh the harm?