[joannanewsom]

You are arguing from an "fairness" standpoint but none of that matters if your proposed policy would the lives of people in poverty worse. That's where we differ. I think that if you enforce an equal-pay-for-equal-work law, you will see an increase in wages in the US and a decrease in wages in low-income countries. That is the opposite of the desired effect and a negative outcome.

> Offer them all $1.

Everyone regardless of where they are gets payed the same. Am I understanding this correctly?

So, like I said in my area the minimum wage is $18.50/hr. So a multi-national company that has people tagging data in my area would pay a minimum of $18.50/hr. And under your proposed equal-pay-for-equal-work, if that company were to hire people in Nigeria to tag data they would _have_ to pay $18.50/hr. Correct?

Would that company have an incentive to outsource work to Nigeria if they had to pay people the same $18.50/hr? This is a country ranked 154/180 on the corruption index. It is the 17th least peaceful country and has far worse infrastructure relative to the US. I think these companies would be significantly less motivated to outsource jobs Nigeria if they can hire people locally for the same price. Would you agree? If you think that companies would be more or equally likely to outsource jobs to Nigeria if they wages were $18.50/hr please elaborate.

Far fewer jobs being outsourced to Nigeria, means less job opportunities for Nigerians and worse economic outcomes. Right?

If requiring equal-pay-for-equal-work leads to worse economic outcomes for Nigerians then isn't it a bad policy?

[ninjagoo]

Since you are so interested in reducing poverty and improving economic outcomes for those people abroad, what percentage of your first-world income/wealth are you sending to these impoverished regions? And for comparison, how does that amount compare to your donations to church and conservative causes?

Or am I confused and your concern only extends to reducing other people's (say for example less fortunate US women and unfortunate Nigerians) net income and definitely not your own income?

[joannanewsom]

I donate 5% of my income to Malaria Consortium and Clean Air Task Force. It could be more, but it's significant for me. I would encourage you to look at givewell.org and donate to help people living in extreme poverty.

I'm surprised you think I'm conservative. :)

[ninjagoo]

In that case, I apologize. I mistook genuine questions for obtuseness and the typical misdirectional hand-waving. With this new insight let me try again. You are right, I agree that as a policy equal-pay-for-equal work will indeed lead to a reduction in outsourcing. The solution to poverty in that case can be 2-fold (a) direct reparations, and (b) Marshall plans like for Germany and the world after WW2 [1].

It turns out that the Marshall plan was a large set of grants for billions of $ (big money in those days). There were some loans too with reasonable terms and reasonable payments, and because of natural inflation over time the payments became insignificant compared to the size of the German economy [2]. Maybe a modern day Marshall Plan with a mix of reasonable loans and grants is a good way to not shortchange either us Americans or the recipients.

Compare that with the outsourcing fiasco that has been Industry moving to China due to cheaper labor there. This did make the Chinese better off, and made the industrialists very very rich, but it gutted the American heartland and impoverished the people there, leading to the rise of Christian extremism and fascism in the US. We don't know yet if this was a fatal blow to the body politic and democracy worldwide, it's an ongoing crisis.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan

[2] https://www.cnbc.com/2015/03/18/who-still-owes-what-for-the-...