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Bikes, China, WalMart, and Stuff

This article originally appeared as a posting to the iBob e-mail list. I left it as it was originally written.

There is no simple answer to all of this. Does trade help China? Maybe. But the reality is that we, as Americans, buy lots of stuff from China and WalMart because consumerism is out of control and trumps any other value. We want STUFF and everything else is unimportant. We'll close up clean-running factories that pay good wages and open up toxic slave-wage factories just so we can buy more stuff.

Now, this is not out of necessity and don't tell me that it is. 99% of all Americans (me included) have way more stuff than we need. We want to buy more stuff because we are gluttons. If we had to pay US-level wages for all this junk, we couldn't afford it. We would have to live more moderate lifestyles, and that is plain unAmerican! The American lifestyle is one of excess.

Ask Americans these two questions: 1) Would you buy products from factories that pollute the environment, pay slave labor wages, and offer unsafe working conditions? Most would say "no." 2) Would you rather pay $3 for a pair of American-made underwear or $2 for a 3-pack of Chinese-made underwear? The answer will be the Chinese-made underwear each and every time (even when you ask union workers), and they will have already forgotten about question number 1. As someone wise once said, we are selling our soul for cheap underwear.

I would argue that nearly nobody on this list has to buy Chinese-made goods out of economic necessity. We can argue about my definition of "economic necessity," but I can back up my definition with multiple trips to China and stories that would make your head spin. If any of us buy Chinese-made goods it is either because that item is no longer made anywhere else (which is quite common) or because we want to save money to buy even more stuff. For myself, I am making an effort to make do with less and have my purchases represent some value besides my own gluttony. When the only value we have is the lowest price, then the cost will be seen in the wages, benefits, working conditions, and environment of us all.

When it comes to bikes, frames, and bike parts, there aren't that many choices left. Taiwan and China have really cornered the market, and China is taking big chunks away from Taiwan. Europe and the USA are really small fries in the big picture. Still, as consumers, you have a few choices. Make sure that you feel good about the purchase that you make, and maybe the best choice is to make no purchase at all.