Capitalism vs. Child Labor. Alex Epstein visits Occupy Orange County

[gammazuma]

Banning child labor doesn't magically pull families out of poverty, but that doesn't mean child labor is acceptable. It means that we should help those people get out of their poor economic situation. Americans have the most money in the world, but instead of using that money to help the people of the world have a sustainable lifestyle, we give that money to the super rich. That's what needs to change.

[cooljool1]

@gammazuma the answer is more capitalism and more freedom.

[grantsinmypants2]

Ironically, I believe him... we cant get what we have... a shaven head pseudo-intellectual Marxist bullshitter... without oppressing other people... Which is exactly why I suppose LF capitalism.

[bantyhenrants]

I got what you were saying about child labor in China. I think the only thing you left out was that if it wasn't for our government regulations Steve Jobs would have never had to move his factories to China in the first place.

[selfyeshua]

Capitalism scapegoat.Blame it all on it while the real perpetrator is free.its a Chinese law and violation of human rights that allows children to work.Maybe if China would not enable it then foreign companies wouldnt employ children. The OWC propose that we do the moral thing at all cost.we will take the work from the Chinese,even if it means that the children would starve to death.The same kind of morality led to the genocide of 2 million Vietnamese under the patronage of the flower generation

[MrDarknessandDeath]

The occupiers wear clothes, have phones, all made by children. This is just white guilt.

[enmartinsen81]

It seems like every single argument a left-winger makes ignores the fact that human beings have free will. Capitalists create jobs; they don't force people to take them. They simply give people more alternatives.

[w99brain]

these guys look pretty anti-adult labor too

[wisted]

No one forces a child to work at Nike. These people (and children) choose to work at Nike, and they earn more than they would at locally owned businesses. Child labor is an opportunity. The alternative is lower pay, continued destitution, and possibly prostitution.

[MrDarknessandDeath]

"freedom is slavery" is the message of the protesters.

[TheWorlandsc]

China's labor force has increased their wage amount in the last few years, the New York Times even pointed this out. I think that this fact conclusively proves the main occupier's theory, that if workers striked they would just move jobs elsewhere, wrong. You could have also said something about moving cost to point out the absurdity in that statement. Those kind of statements are completely baseless and should be pointed out as such

[ryanpmurphy]

In the US there is a legal distinction made for agriculture when it concerns child labor. *Blank out*

Children around the world would starve to death if they did not work. *Blank out*

Sweat shops usually pay higher wages and provide easier work than agricultural jobs in developing countries. *Blank out*

[swanberger]

What their argument amounts to is this: It is OPPRESSION to give a starving child an opportunity to make a living and therefore a chance to survive. That's "oppression" and immoral and should be banned. As for the historical account, Alex Epstein is correct. It was not laws or unionization (as these people seem to think) which got rid of child labor in the industrialized-capitalist West: it was economic progress. Once the parents made enough to support their children, child labor went away.

[Alexshrugged92]

These people are helpless. It has been the rise of capitalism globally (I use this term loosely because all markets are varying degrees of mixed-economies) and the wealth produced in our modern economy which has allowed people to not have to work 18 hour days just to survive. It is the entrepreneur who produces capital which allows for people to have higher wages and ultimately more productive livelihoods. Labor has always been existent throughout human history.

[internetlings]

wow. i hope you're keeping an open mind. these are great discussions

[cikatrizmusic]

What does corporations has to do with the necessities of people in underdeveloped countries? they should be praised! they are providing with the means of survival in those countries! it is a good thing that those kids have a corporation giving them a job that allows them to survive. America needs a lot of education!! they just don't see what gives raise to the problem!

[Virtueman1]

I like these videos and I hope you continue making them.

[StudentOfObjectivism]

These people are incredibly stupid... They don't intend to listen that's why they continuously try to talk over you.

[TeenageCapitalist]

Yes the children are being forced to work. BUT, they are forced to work there not by a thug threatening them but by the fact that anything else they do will not be productive enough to feed themselves. They are forced to work because the only alternative is starving to death without the benefits of the American companies.

[qtutoringhelps]

@TeenageCapitalist

From a Marxian point of view, poor countries are poor because rich countries make them poor via exploitation. If everyone would just share all the resources, standard of livings everywhere would go up and we wouldn't have such unjust poverty.

[saladinkeyes]

@qtutoringhelps The companies are paying them to do work the people want to do. What's the problem. And what gives anyone the right to other people's wealth?

[qtutoringhelps]

Steve Jobs never employed child labourers in China. That is flat out false. And to the extent that child labour exists, it's due to lack of a civil, industrial society, preceding any system of capitalism.

[natritious1]

these people are refusing to give up their paradigm, but when they think about it on their own, they may just change their minds

[rocketraman]

@anti0918 Right -- children prevented from working in factories may even end up in prostitution rings (University of Colorado economist Keith Maskus quoted in Tomas Larsson's book "Race to the Top"). Are those children working by consent of their parents or not? If not, then obviously that is simply slavery and wrong. But if yes, then what moral right do OWSers or anyone else have to tell them no?

[7NTM61Ic]

Alex, you should lay down a ground rule to speak with only one person at a time. They can always put you on the defensive and make it look like they are "winning" if you cannot lead any one of them down a logical, reasoned path.

[7NTM61Ic]

Alex, you should lay down a ground rule to speak with only one person at a time.

[anti0918]

Epic failure on the "gay marriage" gotcha, not realizing that Alex isn't some religious conservative.

[scepticsteve]

Facinating how people just make up their own parallel universe and declare narratives to be historic facts while the evidence proves the contrary...

[ChristopherWEarl]

Oh, well. It was worth a try.

[anti0918]

They keep bringing up how corporations are "exploiting" child labor in foreign countries, without asking themselves what the alternative would be for those children and their families. Banning child labor doesn't magically pull families out of poverty - it only makes their living conditions worse, and forces those children to starve, work to death on the family farm, or resort to gang violence to survive.