Global Fashion: Who is the Victim?

A typical 14 year old in the U.K. might be wearing an outfit costing �60 in total. What they don't realize is how that outfit kits them all out in geography.

Global fashion is when different parts of the clothing are being made in different countries because it is cheap. This encourages countries to interact.

Your outfit, probably links the world together. Take jeans for e.g. the zip of your jeans are made in Japan, Brass rivets and buttons are made from Australian zinc and Namibian copper, the jeans are made from cotton grown in Benin, the denim is woven and dyed in Italy, sewn in Tunisia, and then jeans are stone-washed using pumice from an inactive volcano in Turkey before being sold all over the world.

This is called interdependence. The clothes are manufactured in LEDCs, but the company's headquarters are likely to be in U.S.A., which is a MEDC.

A shirt bought from the U.K. costs around �15 and is made in countries like Bangladesh and India.

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The person making that shirt gets paid between $2.50 - $3.40 for a 10 hour non-stop working day. A football shirt bought from a Nike store in the U.K. costs �15 - �40 and is made in Portugal or Morocco. The person making that t-shirt gets paid 20p daily. A tracksuit bottom bought from Nike or Reebok costs �35 and is made in Indonesia.

The person making this bottom gets paid 50p a day. TNCs (trans-national corporations - large worldwide companies) don't make their clothing in their own country, because it is always a lot cheaper to get the job done elsewhere (cheap labour).

There would be more profits by paying less money to workers in LEDCs, than there would be by paying more money to workers in MEDCs. The companies export the resources needed from one LEDC to another LEDC for the clothing to be sewn. Then they import it to MEDCs for the clothing to be sold for high prices. All together they don't spend much money to get the clothing made, but put the cost way up. Companies like Nike get extremely high profits. Therefore, I and most other people believe this is exploiting LEDCs.

Workers in MEDCs have better conditions and earn higher wages than workers in LEDCs. This is because in LEDCs, there is a very high population therefore a higher demand for work. People in the LEDCs will need a job to earn money to improve their living conditions. In MEDCs there is less demand for work, because if the people don't work they still get money through benefits.

People in MEDCs have good living conditions and the education for their children is free. In LEDCs the people have to earn money because there are no benefits and they have to pay for their children's schooling. Usually in a LEDC even children in the families have to work. This tells us that LEDCs have less GDP income per capita than MEDCs. The higher the GDP income per capita the higher up the HDI (human development index).

The main advantages of Globalisation are that TNCs make big profits. There are more jobs available in LEDC's through globalisation. Nike can make more profits by employing more workers in LEDCs. An advantage to the MEDCs is that the if the TNCs in the MEDC make big profits, the MEDC's GDP income per capita will rise. A disadvantage for MEDCs is that former workers would not have any more jobs to go to as the factories have moved to LEDCs. A disadvantage to a LEDC is that the workers are exploited, but on the other hand at least they have jobs. A disadvantage to TNCs is that other companies will be offering higher wages to workers so that they can get a area to create a large factory to compete with the rest.

You and I are all fashion victims, because we are paying lots of money for something that is so cheap to make. Workers in other countries are also victims of the industry, because they get paid so little to make clothes that are sold for so much.