Is buying products that are the result of labor exploitation ever ethically viable? The question most central to this discussion is whether or not labor exploitation is a relative or absolute evil. And as with most things in life, the answer is not the same for each situation. The best way to achieve the golden mean in this area of life is to know what forms of labor exploitation are practiced and to determine which ones are ethnocentric judgments and which are truly human tragedies. One argument about labor exploitation is that the concept was developed by the labor movement. Through a combination of lobbying, strikes, and public awareness the "developed countries" instituted laws that set working conditions. Because these obviously make workers lives better, and since most people are workers at one time or another, these initiatives were beneficial to society.
However, they are only possible because the countries that set the laws have reached a minimum level of economic development. What we see as worker exploitation may in fact be the maturing of an economic system. Take for example minimum wage. This is a legal protection for the least educated and most vulner
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