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How Sweatshop Wages Compare to Alternatives
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2014
The national media spotlight focused on sweatshops in 1996 after Charles Kernaghan of the National Labor Committee accused Kathie Lee Gifford of exploiting children in Honduran sweatshops. He flew a fifteen-year-old worker, Wendy Diaz, to the United States to meet Kathie Lee. Kathie Lee exploded into tears and apologized on the air, promising to pay higher wages.
Should Kathie Lee have cried? Wendy reportedly earned 31 cents per hour. Assuming that Wendy worked six days per week for ten hours per day – which is not uncommon in a sweatshop – she would have earned $967.00 over the course of a year. That translates into approximately $2.75 per day to live on. But in 1996, more than 15 percent of Hondurans lived on less than $1.00 per day, and nearly 30 percent lived on less than $2.00 per day. Wendy’s income is not just higher than that of people in abject poverty; it is $262.00 above the average income in Honduras that year.
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