That is a cool commercial.

And I understand the knocks on Nike, et al., but lemme ask you folks this: With respect to sweat shops, what do you think those kids that work there would be doing if they weren't working there? Do you see them sitting by the pool sipping lemonade? Or do you see them working themselves to the bone to try to help their family raise crops or cattle, working similar hours under similar conditions, only outside? The truth may very well be in the middle, but still. What kind of life do you envision for those that work for American or other companies that have a reputation for exploiting cheap labor? When I think about it, I see them closer to the second example I mention.

I think that the truth is that the developing world is just stuck between a rock and a hard place. As technology has brought a greater awareness of what's out there, the demand for a labor market that will pay for labor has grown. We can lament this by saying that we should never have opened Pandora's Box and started this desire to live at a higher living standard, but that's not in any way realistic. So, the reality of the situation is that people are willing and able to work in exchange for money, which they can use to buy food or clothes or grain or some hope of what they've started to see as a better life. Obviously, the extreme examples of abuse are abhorrent, but the day to day for many of these people comes down to a decision of working themselves to death to try to feed themselves with what they may be able to grow on lands that are often not suitable for growing or have been overused or working themselves to death to try to give themselves some leverage and not be reliant on the former. It's not a good situation, but it's a part of reality for developing economies. History shows that every major economy has had more than its share of labor force exploitation. We can just hope that, like the developed economies of today, the developing world finds itself looking back at its history of exploitation one day and shaking its head.