>>A friend of mine - a lifelong leftist, a self-identified socialist
even - who spent two years as a reporter in Vietnam interviewed many
young women who worked for Nike. They said factory work was a lot
better than what they would have faced on the farm - e.g., chasing
rats around rice paddies. I haven't been there and done the
interviews myself, but that's what she said.<<
I don't doubt it. I'm less sure about Michael's point that Nike pays better than local industry specifically in Vietnam, but it seems pretty intuitive that working in a factory is better than working in a field. The question is whether they would have worked the same hours back on the farm, or whether they would actually have spent a lot of the working day in education. I don't pretend to have enough specific knowledge of Vietnam to answer that question, but suspect that there has been some substitution.
dd
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