From: Lan Barnes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
On Mon, Sep 25, 2006 at 04:15:00PM -0500, Gabriel Sechan wrote:
>
>
>
> >From: "Paul G. Allen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> >So, John, Lan, and anyone else, what is the answer to competing with
> >manufacturing markets that basically have forced and child labor?
>
> Very simple- require any company selling a product in US markets to
follow
> US employment, work safety, environmental, etc laws regaurdless of
physical
> location of manufacture in order to sell in the US. Punishment for
> breaking this is 10 times the gross revenue for the lifetime of the
> product, and life in jail for the CEO. I garuntee you it would work-
the
> consequences of not following it would outweigh the risks.
>
> It would also tank our economy, and raise consumer prices by at least
100%.
> The question is: how much are our values worth to us? The unfortunate
> answer is that they aren't worth much, look at how well Nike still does.
>
> Gabe
>
We might be able to step into such a solution gradually, but it would
require a commitment that spanned changes in administrations.
Thus the problem of democracy- its very hard to do anything gradually or
have any type of X year plan, where X is longer than 1 election cycle.
THis kind of thing could be eased into- implement a foreign minimum wage,
and slowly increase it. Implement a subest of environmental and health
issues, and slowly increase it. Over a decade or two the pain would be
minimal. It'd probably result in an even stronger worldwide economy, as the
people in outsourcing countries would actually be able to buy stuff from us
as well. Of course, it'd be killed the instant the republicans or the more
bought wing of the democrats had control.
The solution is clear. We need to toss out Congress and replace it with
something that can actually implement long term plans. I nominate myself.
King Gabe has a nice ring to it.
Gabe
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