Communism!

[joshua johnson]

I have not read all of this thread, but I will throw in my two cents here for fun.

I think capitalism is great for many in developed countries....because most people could find niches to get ahead if they chose to look and take action. Lots of people either don't look, or chose not to take action for their certain reasons. I won't try to list all the reasons since there are several, depending on the person's situation.

Likewise, I think capitalism is not so great for lots of people. There are people in third world countries that would fit a developed country's definition of "exploited." This can include situations where people start working and are charged money for their tools which they have to buy on a loan at a high rate of interest to start working. Of course there is only one price for the tools and only one place to get the loan....the company they are going to work for. Then while they try to work off this debt, they get paid minimal wages, but have to buy their personal goods at the company store and stay at the company dorm/apartments, which have higher prices than normal. These people also do not have what a developed country would call a "normal exposure to educational opportunities", both in childhood and as adults.

All that being said, I think that capitalism eventually leads to rising prosperity in "exploited" areas, because some money does flow in, it is just very slow in the start.

Ultimately, I think that the world economy will become more balanced than today....but it could take 200 years. USA is a strong economy now, but they are net consumers and not net producers. This can't last forever, it is like spending more than your salary every year, only the USA does it on a national basis rather than an individual basis. Also, as a percentage of GNP, health care has grown tremendously. Everybody talks about how strong the health care sector is, but you don't really add any value to an economy by spending money caring for the sick/elderly. It is a money drain. This is bound to get worse before it gets better, by pure demographics. (Don't think that I have any good solutions to propose here, since there are good ethical reasons to spend money to care for people, there just aren't any good economical reasons to do it)

China, India, and maybe some others will be stronger in 50 or 100 years, if they can keep environmental problems from destroying their natural resource base (who wants to live in a toxic poisoned environment?)

Europe is already in decline, and will be less important in world economy and politics in mere dozens of years.

Anyway...those are my opinions. I live in the USA, and I will make one last comment. Not many people are still alive who are old enough to remember in a mature fashion the Great Depression in the 1930's. We should all keep in mind that it could happen again. The economic forces at hand with all the retirees drawing out of Social Security, the loss of industrial manufacturing, and the net consumption society makes it even more possible.

[The Industriallist]

Likewise, I think capitalism is not so great for lots of people. There are people in third world countries that would fit a developed country's definition of "exploited." This can include situations where people start working and are charged money for their tools which they have to buy on a loan at a high rate of interest to start working. Of course there is only one price for the tools and only one place to get the loan....the company they are going to work for. Then while they try to work off this debt, they get paid minimal wages, but have to buy their personal goods at the company store and stay at the company dorm/apartments, which have higher prices than normal. These people also do not have what a developed country would call a "normal exposure to educational opportunities", both in childhood and as adults.

That may well be happening in other countries. It's certainly been done in the US. Do note that that is not a demonstration of free-market capitalism abusing the workers, though. That's an example of non-free-market capitalism abusing the workers.

Ultimately, I think that the world economy will become more balanced than today....but it could take 200 years. USA is a strong economy now, but they are net consumers and not net producers. This can't last forever, it is like spending more than your salary every year, only the USA does it on a national basis rather than an individual basis. Also, as a percentage of GNP, health care has grown tremendously. Everybody talks about how strong the health care sector is, but you don't really add any value to an economy by spending money caring for the sick/elderly. It is a money drain. This is bound to get worse before it gets better, by pure demographics. (Don't think that I have any good solutions to propose here, since there are good ethical reasons to spend money to care for people, there just aren't any good economical reasons to do it)

The sick not necessarily, the elderly as a rule yes. Scary point there.

Or is it? You could extend your definition of value to include long lives and good health. After all, not everything of value is tangible or transferrable. That might result in having less tangible goods, but that's a matter of choice. The real problem there is that the people who end up with less tangible goods aren't, for the more part, the ones who get the intangible goods, because of this pesky thing called retirement...but that doesn't come into the underlying economics, just into the politics of wealth redistribution.

Europe is already in decline, and will be less important in world economy and politics in mere dozens of years.

I'm not sure why. I've gotten the impression that they're ahead in making use of nuclear power, for example. And they aren't putting any stress on their economies to run global dominance games.

Anyway...those are my opinions. I live in the USA, and I will make one last comment. Not many people are still alive who are old enough to remember in a mature fashion the Great Depression in the 1930's. We should all keep in mind that it could happen again. The economic forces at hand with all the retirees drawing out of Social Security, the loss of industrial manufacturing, and the net consumption society makes it even more possible.

Actually, I don't think that any of those forces could lead to something resembling the Great Depression. The Great Depression, from what I've read, was based on a fall-off in demand, in the pattern of traditional depressions and downturns. All the factors you listed would seem to point to strong and continued demand.

I would say those point more to 1970's style stagflation, resulting from falling supply as remaining American businesses get driven down by rising costs.

The other possible crisis is that we find out what happens when the US spends its way out of international credit. I don't know of a historical analogue...but I expect that whatever it looks like, it'll be messy.

[joshua johnson]

I don't really know how to quote stuff, so I'll just respond a bit to a few things that The Industrialist said.

On the value of extending life and so forth. I should clarify that there are good economic reasons to have good health care, including keeping a healthy (and productive) workforce. For that, relatively small health care dollars improve the health and "working lifetime" of the average worker. The real imbalance is when tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent on high cost care options for nursing homes stays, organ transplants, cancer care, for those whose remaining lives are counted in months (I know some people will be offended here, remember this is a economic discussion, not an ethical one, I have relatives in high cost care too). The economic drain is that these members of society are not economic producers, and they are not even true economic consumers, they are mostly just health care consumers.

On Europe and their decline. They have similar demographic issues to the US, and in many cases worse since the birth rate is far below replacement in many countries. Now this could be good for the environment to have less people taxing the natural resources of our world, but it is not good for economies. Europe is also saddled with many pension programs that are economically unfeasible, much like the Social Security in the US, and in many cases worse. Thankfully, they don't also try to support global militaries too.

On the Great Depression. I didn't actually mean to imply that the next crisis would be the same, although I see how that would come accross. More I meant to suggest that there could very well be a next crisis, of equal magnitude. You are correct that the US could spend it's way into a credit crunch, with global consequences, most likely. What those will be are hard to tell, but I am sure that they won't be good for most people in developed countries.

[The Industriallist]

Cheerfully dropping the points on which we agree or I conceed

On the value of extending life and so forth. I should clarify that there are good economic reasons to have good health care, including keeping a healthy (and productive) workforce. For that, relatively small health care dollars improve the health and "working lifetime" of the average worker. The real imbalance is when tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent on high cost care options for nursing homes stays, organ transplants, cancer care, for those whose remaining lives are counted in months (I know some people will be offended here, remember this is a economic discussion, not an ethical one, I have relatives in high cost care too). The economic drain is that these members of society are not economic producers, and they are not even true economic consumers, they are mostly just health care consumers.

Many (possibly most in this age) goods that are produced are luxuries, not things that improve the productivity of the workforce in any clear or verifiable way. Keeping "high-cost care" patients alive and semi-well is (approximately) no more or less productive than professional sports, for example. The massive entertainment industry doesn't increase productivity much, if at all, but it's a huge portion of the economy. This type of health care is, in a disturbing sort of way, an exact parallel.

Remember that the goal is to feed wants, not to bury the country 20-deep in cars.

[joshua johnson]

Good point about entertainment, it really doesn't create much net wealth either. It is a transfer of wealth. As a society, we are using up other resources all the time, when we eat, drive, buy goods, or whatever. Ultimately though, nothing is created by most of the activities.

Interestingly, there is an eerie correlation between Cantr and real life in the creation of wealth. The source of all wealth is the ground in Cantr. This could also be true in real life.

Food (farming) and resource collection (mining, logging, fishing, etc) are the two biggest that actually create something that wasn't there before. Now many of those industries are not major money makers, although some, like oil, are. There are lots of refining industries down line that add value in one way or another through combining these inputs into things that people want or need.

Entertainment, however, doesn't actually create wealth, it expends energy and dollars and transfers wealth. The same could be said for many service industries, although some are not quite as easy to see.

[The Industriallist]

Well, the thoery that I folow says that services do involve the creation of value, it's just that the value doesn't have a material form and (usually) must be produced and consumed at the same time and in the same place. That doesn't make it any less real value. After all, value derives from the willingness of people to pay for something, in capitalism.

I don't think that value-added manufacturing steps (like oil refining and every form of manufacturing) could be considered non-wealth-producing by anyone, no matter how goods-centered. The product may contain less mass and contain the same elements as the input, but it obviously has greater real value. Even something very simple, like a screw...there's no questin that a 1-gram screw is more valuable than a randomly-shaped gram of the same alloy. This is something that's being hammered into cantr, but people seem to have difficulty understanding it at times.

In cantr there is no service sector, really. There have been attempts, but since the basic system doesn't have any use for services (no repairs...), they're kind of artificial.

[joshua johnson]

See, I think I differ on services in this. I agree that services are are VALUABLE....meaning people will pay something for them. But I contend that they do not actually CREATE value, and perhaps I should explain what I mean by that, because we might be differing more on what we think we mean than on what we mean.

So your question is...what is the difference? Think of it this way...Things that create value all generally stem from the earth in some way...and you can resell them to someone. Or you can combine them with other things (refining) and sell the new product. For example...you can cut down a tree and sell it, or you can chop it up into lumber and sell that, or you can glue and nail the lumber together into a chair and sell that. In each case, you added some labor or other goods (nails) to increase the value, and the increased value is actually retained for a time. This is creating value. Civilisations can start and flourish with this type of economic activity, as long as they have access to (either locally or from trade) the raw resources, or at least access to resources less refined than their output, so that the labor and refining they add is somewhat retained.

Conversely, you cannot buy a massage from someone, and then turn around and resell the massage you just got. A massage for payment is a transfer of value. If you buy a massage you have purchased another person's time and effort, but it is not retained, it is used and gone. A certain amount of services in any economy is useful and sustainable. But an economy cannot self sustain on services, if I sell massages and we have three friends that sell insurance, taxi service, and legal advice, we better hope we find a farmer and a home builder who wants our services so we can get some food and a place to live. But the farmer and the home builder can look at our services as optional...nice but not required to live. In any case, services transfer wealth rather than create it. They are important and valuable, because some people want to have services, but they don't actually create wealth (this is different than saying that people don't get wealthy by offering services, because people can transfer a lot of wealth to get services).

On the other paragraph, you and I agree that refining processes are adding value and creating wealth.

[The Industriallist]

Ah...but (A) not all services can be regarded as optional and (B) The home-builder, the blacksmith, and everyone else in your mini-economy had better hope that the farmer (and every other occupation they need to survive) is interested in what they offer, re-sellable or not, unless you have this nice thing called currency.

Extending (A)...all your examples are (to a degree) luxury services. But doctors are service providers too, as is the smith when he is repairing someone's tools instead of making no ones. Without both of them the farmer is likely going to have a hard time living long. Not to mention soldiers/guards, in most environments.

Also. You call a massage for payment a transfer of value. That's exactly right, since selling anything is a transfer of value one way and money the other (or value both ways in a barter system). But the value that is transfered is also both created and consumed as it is transferred. This means that it doesn't exactly exist at any time, but we can tell it's being transferred by the movement of money. It must be created during the transaction because it has to come from somewhere, and the massage-seller can't have gotten it from someone else.

Something about goods you need to consider...they get consumed too. Value is always being consumed. Use something, and you deplete it's value. Services you consume the value as fast as it's created, and at the same time. Some goods, such as food, you actually consume much faster than they are created (months to grow wheat, minutes to eat bread). Others, like furniture or machinery, can be expected to last longer than it took to make them...but you do use them up (IRL. Not in cantr...which one reason the economy can't work right). At least unless you 'recharge' them by getting them maintained (a service that, atypically, creates lasting value).
But for any form of value in a real economy, to benefit from it you consume it.

Digressing...since the function of money is as a stand-in for actual value, if you assume a non-defective trading system (i.e.: people have sound knowledge of the value of things) (and ignore wierd, complicated social things like gifts, that don't enter in to normal economic analysis) you can equate value flow one way to money flow the other. So anyone with a balanced personal budget is selling as much value as they're buying, presumably in different forms.

[Pirog]

Are you actually attempting to say that people have no choice but take the work? Not no economically feasable choice, but no choice other than direct execution? Because unless you are, it isn't slavery.

Of course I'm not. But freedom of choice when you are lacking alternatives isn't real freedom. It's like the mock democracy Saddam Hussein had, where people had the right to vote, but he was the only candidate...
(And no, I'm not saying that it is actual slavery...but it is very similar)

Of course, it's generally assumed that when you offer someone a job, you are at least not doing them any harm...they can turn you down. Taxes aren't the point.

Also, they get out of taxes because the governments would rather have the jobs without the taxes than neither. Jobs benefit the people who get them. Taxes benefit the government, and in theory would be spent to benefit the people.

Yes, but this seems to be something you see as great.
Personally I think it is disgusting that they exploit weaker nations just to make a profit...

And...presumably the third-worlders considered both of their transactions fair enough, since after actual colonialism was over they were not forced to sell or buy.

By then they were allready deep in debt.
But the point you are making is interesting. Post-colonialistic theory talks much about how the former colonies adapted the same social structures like the opressors used and still saw themselves as less worth.

"forced" again...they weren't forced to buy things they couldn't afford, they chose to buy the products and borrow the money. Free Markets allow you to mess up, perturbations allow you to mess up badly, and non-free market interferences can help you mess up really badly. But anyone who decided to take a loan to buy equipment to increase productivity of a farm (say) where the increase won't pay for the loan is willingly shooting themselves in the foot, and that's their stupid mistake. It isn't some outside force driving them down.

But should there be no moral at all involved?
Just like private persons or companies can make bad investments the same applies to countries...but they can't just declare bancrupcy (sp?) and start over.

Writing off loans = forcing their businesses to make large gifts of money to other countries. Which is OK with me, but it's hardly an obligation.

I have never said it is an obligation...but considering Western history, of exploiting the rest of the world and building our wealth on deals that were very often driven through by unfair methods or threats of violence, I would say the choice not to do it is very bad.
And when planes come crashing into buildings perhaps some people should draw other conclusions than that the terrorists ideology is built on other things than pure hatred against mankind...

Throughout you seem to be saying that if the government doesn't have money, everyone suffers, and having the option of buying things is bad for you.

No, I'm saying that totally free markets aren't always the best alternative.
Let me make an example of what can happen if you just let the market be totally free.

The third world country X has a large population of farmers and in the local markets the competition is made up of small scale farmers. Suddenly a huge international company decides to take over the market. With their gathered wealth they dump their prices and sell products for such low prices that they don't even make a profit. The poor people in X are happy that they can buy more with their small funds. The small scale farmers can't compete with the big company and suddenly it stands as the only supplier of products in the country.
Then they raise the prices again, and the population has no other choice but to buy the products from them since all the competition is wiped out.

I would say that X's government would have every right to tax or otherwise prevent the big company from destroying their economy.

[Pirog]

All the problems you cite in 3rd world countries have nothing to do with international trade. Of course wealth distribution is very uneven and the standard of living is very low. This is not the fault of free trade.

Dictators like Stalin and the way communism has worked out so far has nothing to do with communism...still it would be unwise to totally disregard from a possible effect of a communistic revolution.
The same goes with free trade...

Trade restrictions imposed by other countries have some negative impact.

I agree that they aren't always good. No option is best from all perspectives...if it was like that all countries would use the same method.

You have a very Romantic view of the strife of the proletariat, but I'm afraid it's a bit inaccurate and your knowledge of economics is questionable.

I willingly agree (and I pointed this our earlier) that my knowledge of economics isn't the best. I may be wrong on some (perhaps even all) things I have said here...

[The Industriallist]

Are you actually attempting to say that people have no choice but take the work? Not no economically feasable choice, but no choice other than direct execution? Because unless you are, it isn't slavery.

Of course I'm not. But freedom of choice when you are lacking alternatives isn't real freedom. It's like the mock democracy Saddam Hussein had, where people had the right to vote, but he was the only candidate...
(And no, I'm not saying that it is actual slavery...but it is very similar)

If they don't have to take the job you cannot possibly be hurting them by offering them one. Yes, the working conditions are bad and the pay is low. But if that were worse than whatever the people were doing before they got the job (remember, these people did live before the company came). That means that they have an alternative that they were presumably surviving (more or less) under. So if they'd rather have whatever marginal living they had before than the pay with suffering that the company offers, they can do that. If most of them prefer that, the company is going to be in trouble.

Of course, it's generally assumed that when you offer someone a job, you are at least not doing them any harm...they can turn you down. Taxes aren't the point.

Also, they get out of taxes because the governments would rather have the jobs without the taxes than neither. Jobs benefit the people who get them. Taxes benefit the government, and in theory would be spent to benefit the people.

Yes, but this seems to be something you see as great.
Personally I think it is disgusting that they exploit weaker nations just to make a profit...

Welll...firstly, they'd still be making a profit by operating in those countries. Tax breaks are just another bonus. Secondly...companies 'exploit' states of the USA in the exact same way. When companies have a choice of location, and both locations want them to come, naturally incentives are offered.

And the first sentence isn't true...I consider it natural that they can deal with the government when they have a position of strength to counter the government's intrinsic power. I don't particularly apply moral judgements to the existance of negotiating principles.

And...presumably the third-worlders considered both of their transactions fair enough, since after actual colonialism was over they were not forced to sell or buy.

By then they were allready deep in debt.
But the point you are making is interesting. Post-colonialistic theory talks much about how the former colonies adapted the same social structures like the opressors used and still saw themselves as less worth.

Really? I rather doubt that the new governments of freed colonies chose to take responsibility for debts that were made before they existed. Any of their people who had debts might have had no choice...I wonder who the loans to buy manufactured goods were to, though. Large loans to individual poor third-worlders don't seem likely.

Actually there is nothing intrinsically wrong with exporting raw materials and importing finished goods. Manufacturing doesn't have some special status as the profitable bit in an economy...every sector can make a profit. The reasons that third-world countries tend to have trouble generating net exports include: most of their economies being devoted to the already saturated farming industry and massive inefficiency/corruption in the exploitation of any special natural resources.

"forced" again...they weren't forced to buy things they couldn't afford, they chose to buy the products and borrow the money. Free Markets allow you to mess up, perturbations allow you to mess up badly, and non-free market interferences can help you mess up really badly. But anyone who decided to take a loan to buy equipment to increase productivity of a farm (say) where the increase won't pay for the loan is willingly shooting themselves in the foot, and that's their stupid mistake. It isn't some outside force driving them down.

But should there be no moral at all involved?
Just like private persons or companies can make bad investments the same applies to countries...but they can't just declare bancrupcy (sp?) and start over.

Well, bankruptcy is a relatively recent concept. Not that long ago they had this thing called debtor's prison, sometimes combined with seizing any of your assets they could reach. When you declare bankruptcy, I'm not exactly sure who takes the cost of the loan...either the government pays it off or the bank is forced to throw away a large amount of money that they're supposed to own. Countries can go to their banker's government and ask that the government (which owes protection to the bankers, not to the foreigners...) to essentially rob their own citizens. It works sometimes. Is it moral

Or of course the debtor can simply refuse to pay (defaulting...it happens lately). There's nothing the bank can do, since in this day and age they couldn't get military intervantion to force payment. That's really the equivalent of declaring bankrupcy, with the natural side effect...once you default chances are no bank will be interested in getting ripped off by you again, so it'll be hard to get loans. But probably you won't suffer economic sanctions, and you do get out from under the debt load. The thing is, most governments are willing to do anything to avoid defaulting on their debt, because they want to be able to run up more, they just don't want to pay for what they have. That isn't a moral right of any kind.

Writing off loans = forcing their businesses to make large gifts of money to other countries. Which is OK with me, but it's hardly an obligation.

I have never said it is an obligation...but considering Western history, of exploiting the rest of the world and building our wealth on deals that were very often driven through by unfair methods or threats of violence, I would say the choice not to do it is very bad.
And when planes come crashing into buildings perhaps some people should draw other conclusions than that the terrorists ideology is built on other things than pure hatred against mankind...

Well, you could check, but I seriously doubt that middle eastern countries owe huge sums to the US. With the possible exceptions of our friends in Israel. In the unlikely case that modern large-scale terrorists are motivated by long(well, decades)-abandoned neo-colonialist policies, that still adds up to no way to convince them to quit...we can't change the past.

Throughout you seem to be saying that if the government doesn't have money, everyone suffers, and having the option of buying things is bad for you.

No, I'm saying that totally free markets aren't always the best alternative.
Let me make an example of what can happen if you just let the market be totally free.

The third world country X has a large population of farmers and in the local markets the competition is made up of small scale farmers. Suddenly a huge international company decides to take over the market. With their gathered wealth they dump their prices and sell products for such low prices that they don't even make a profit. The poor people in X are happy that they can buy more with their small funds. The small scale farmers can't compete with the big company and suddenly it stands as the only supplier of products in the country.
Then they raise the prices again, and the population has no other choice but to buy the products from them since all the competition is wiped out.

This is the joy of monopolism. It is one of the actual holes in the free-market idea (though it only exists because there are intrinsic reasons that perfect free markets don't exist...I'd be happy to expand on this ). It doesn't really have anything to do with the third world or international business, though. In fact, a farming business that tried that attack would find itself mauled, since even if they succeed in driving the farmers out of business somehow, they'll pop right back up. Poverty-level farming doesn't have startup costs enough to stop that.

Also, it doesn't do the company any good to sell things to these people who now have no possible income. Remember the business about bankruptcy and defaulting on loans? You can't get money out of someone who doesn't have any.

The thing that big companies do to third-world business is generally just outcompete them fairly. They've got the capital to use the most efficient methods and they've got the means of production and marketing already in place. That means that a disorganized startup without much capital, without experienced managers, and without means of production on hand is going to have a tough time of it. But if the startup can't compete in the market, they should be driven out of it.

I would say that X's government would have every right to tax or otherwise prevent the big company from destroying their economy.

Well, all governments are recognized to have the rights to tax businesses inside their borders, including components of multinationals. Free-trade pressure organizations might make it hard to use tariffs and some other means to keep the companies from doing business with people inside your country. But if you want to stop them from having operations in the country, I think that's not considered objectionable. And no one could complain if you don't want to give them tax breaks to do so. Of course, you've got nothing to complain about then if they go somewhere else that made a better offer.

[Meh]

I learned a new fun term.

You've heard the newspeak work "underdeveloped nation".

We are in "overdeveloped nations".

Just like the sound of it.

[Pirog]

The Industriallist>

I think we just have very, very different views on things...to the point where it is impossible for us to agree on the subject.
To me you sound so right wing and cynical that it got me wondering if you are serious or not...but you probably are.

Just don't think for a second that multinational companies exploit workers in the Western world the same way as they do with the third world. If you believe that you can't ever have been outside your country...

[The Industriallist]

>Meh
Good term. Accurate term. Alarming term.

>Pirog
You can't escape!
Well, actually you can by not posting on the topic anymore...but that would be a vicious thing to do.

I think we just have very, very different views on things...to the point where it is impossible for us to agree on the subject.

Maybe...but I can't pin down your views. Which keeps me from knowing why, or addressing the disagreement.

To me you sound so right wing and cynical that it got me wondering if you are serious or not...but you probably are.

Not fair! You've categorized me...the only category I've put on you is 'debating target'. I don't even know what 'right-wing' means in this context, and I don't know what I've said that's cynical. I can tell you that I think I've meant what I said, but not necessarily what you think I meant.

Just don't think for a second that multinational companies exploit workers in the Western world the same way as they do with the third world. If you believe that you can't ever have been outside your country...

I never said they did...they're legally forbidden to use the low-pay, high-work, poor-conditions practices that they (naturally) prefer in the Western world these days. And I'll agree that they are exploiting the third world workers. I deny that that actually means they are harming those workers.

And I don't like the 'never been outside your country' line much...It's true enough, but I don't see the relevance. If I did travel, I assure you I would not be doing so to go see third world sweatshops. So I doubt I'd even see as much on the topic as I did in a single in-class video.

[Pirog]

Well, I don't want to be vicious...

Maybe...but I can't pin down your views. Which keeps me from knowing why, or addressing the disagreement.

The big disagreement is that you judge the effectivness of the system from how much money it generates while I think that the way people gets treated under that system is more important.
Outsourcing and similar things isn't a favor for the third world, even if it may give them more western currency to buy things with. It is disgusting for large corporations to avoid paying minimum salary by moving their production lines to countries where the population is too poor to have a minimum wage. As soon as a third world country starts making demands, like laws about minimum wages, the Western companies pull out and leave them with a hell of a lot of unemployed people instead...people that will have a hard time to survive since they gave up their life on the countryside with simple agriculture in exhange for working in the industry.

In most sweat shops the workers doesn't even have the rights to form unions, and there have been many cases where the working conditions are so poor and the stress so high that the workers die.

To me that is not a good system regardless of how well it works on a strictly economical basis.

I don't even know what 'right-wing' means in this context, and I don't know what I've said that's cynical.

The cynical part is that you don't seem to care about what I have pointed out above.

The right-wing label is because it is typically right-wing to have such a belief in totally free markets without regulations...probably because it is the left-wing parties that during the history has fought hard for all the things we have nowdays, like minimum wage, the right to form unions etc.
(Basically all the things that keep Western world workers from having the same hell as third world workers have...)

You see...that is the way it has worked so far in modern history.
The left-wing parties fight hard as hell to drive through changes that makes it easier for "workers" to live...things the right-wing parties think is unnecessary or too expensive. When the left-wing parties succeed and people are happy the right-wing parties go along with it and incorporate it in their own politics. Then the left-wing party goes to the next stage, fighting to make it a little bit better...and so it goes on.
Health care, wages, education and almost all things that makes life in our part of the world good was originally driven through by left-wing parties.
(As I write this I'm starting to doubt why I don't vote further out on the left scale than I do...in Swedish standards I'm pretty much in the middle politically. Then of course, even our most right-wing parties would end up far to the left from all American options...and that left-wing tradition in Sweden is what keeps us high up in all list regarding education, working conditions etc. in international studies.)

And I'll agree that they are exploiting the third world workers. I deny that that actually means they are harming those workers.

And for me that is very cynical.
You seem pretty well informed on the matter, so I assume you at least know the basics of how the average sweatshop worker has it...

And I don't like the 'never been outside your country' line much...It's true enough, but I don't see the relevance.

You wouldn't have to visit a sweatshop.
Seeing the living conditions of less fortunate people with your own eyes is a hell of a change from seeing it on a TV screen...believe me.