Sweatshops

This great post by Don Don Boudreaux

I'm surprised by the number of commenters who write as if harsh working conditions of the sort found in sweatshops are something exceptional, something visited upon people in developing countries by we rich folk in developed countries, something crying out for an explanation.

In fact, such conditions have been the norm throughout human history. Life on subsistence farms - which was the lot of the vast majority of our ancestors for the past 10,000 years - was grueling, dreary, and dangerous. And the material returns eked out from the work effort were, well, subsistence - except in the bad times, of which there were many, when these returns were at less than subsistence level. People then literally starved to death. (Indeed, compared with working in subsistence agriculture, working in a sweatshop is surely better - which is one important reason why so many people, today as in the past, have chosen to leave their bucolic hells for cities and towns.)