WAGE SLAVERY AT $1.50 A DAY

You have probably never heard of Chittagong but for many capitalist firms it is a very important place indeed. "Bangladesh is proud of its Chittagong zone, not just because its 137 factories export $1.6bn worth of goods a year, and last year invested $930m, but because it claims to have the cheapest labour in the world and there is a desperate need for foreign currency and jobs. China's minimum wage in its EDZs is $250 a month, Indonesia's $135 and Pakistan's $80. But corporates manufacturing goods in Chittagong need pay workers an average of only $48 a month, said the zone manager. That's about $1.50 a day. " (Guardian, 30 April) Inside capitalism profit means everything and one of the best ways to make a profit is low wages. So where does Nike make its trainers? Or Wrangler its jeans? In the same place Raleigh make its bikes, Philip Morris makes its cigarettes, Korean companies make LED lights, and giant corporations like Walmart, Mothercare, Tesco and Reebok make practically everything from pharmaceuticals to fishing rods and baseball caps. The Chittagong export development zone (EDZ) in Bangladesh is the capital of globalisation, the plumb centre of global free trade, and the reason, it could be argued, that many workers in industrialised countries are now unemployed. RD