Tweet [1]
… is from page 230 of Martin Wolf’s 2004 book, Why Globalization Works [2]:
It is right to say that transnational companies exploit their Chinese workers in the hope of making profits. It is equally right to say that Chinese workers are exploiting transnationals in the (almost universally fulfilled) hope of obtaining higher pay, better training and more opportunities than would otherwise be available to them.
Indeed. And of course what is true in developing countries for relatively poor workers is equally true in developed countries for relatively rich workers – workers including senior partners at prestigious law and accounting firms no less than 16-year-olds newly hired at the minimum wage by McDonald’s and Walmart. (Unfortunately for 16-year-olds and other low-skilled workers, minimum-wage legislation prevents many of them from profitably exploiting employers. These unfortunate workers remain economic outcasts.)