> What does the shirt and pants factory do when the button factory goes on
> strike?
BBC radio recently had a long program on transnational corporate production/supply chains/networks and NAFTA/CAFTA/WTO etc. A buyer from The Gap was interviewed. Complained that due to restrictive tariff barriers she had to buy from hundreds of large and small subcontractors. In that, though there is an advantage to the PMC. One factory say, supplying buttons in Indonesia, is very unlikely to be the only one. A hundred workers go out on strike there, they can easily ramp up production in Malaysia or many other places.
-- Michael Pugliese