Hey, while we're wishing, for my part I wish that everyone made $1B/hr! (After accounting for inflationary effects, of course.) Private jets for everyone!
But back in real life, while $3/hr may not be a lot compared to what some folks make, it's $3/hr more than someone making $0/hr makes, and it's triple what someone making $1/hr makes, and indeed a full 50% raise for anyone making $2/hr.
If I could wave a wand and give everyone who currently makes 0, 1 or 2/hr the skill set and the opportunity to suddenly make $3/hr, I'd be happy to do it. And the billions of people (hundreds of millions maybe?) who suddenly got (in their terms) a huge raise would be pretty happy about it too.
I'm not sure you would be as quick to sarcasm if you spent some time in Chinese factories. It's a though life, even in the good ones. As the purchaser you have a lot of power over the process, not just at one factory, but in which factory you choose. To me that also means you have a responsibility. The least anyone working with Chinese companies should do, is to go and look at the factories.
Yes, it's a tough life, but people actually pick that life because other options are tougher (for example being a rural farmer somewhere).
It is true that we should care about conditions in factories such as these and work to improve them. It's also true that if you insisted that Chinese workers get paid what American workers would, there would have been almost no factories and the entire country would still be in desolate poverty. Yes if there were no factories then probably the environment would be in a better condition.
It's a very complex situation. Just picking one angle to it and insisting that angle holds the whole truth does not help anyone.
I think a lot of western consumers would be more than happy to pay just a little bit more if the $ was going into those workers pockets. But how do you make sure it gets there rather than into the pockets of the factory owner / local politician, where you will already find many, many hundreds of millions of dollars (that "could" have been paid to the poor Chinese factory line worker, rather than to such things as buying some 18 year old son studying in Vancouver a new Ferrari).
Do leaders (political & economic) in non-western countries ever deserve any responsibility for their countries overall well-being?
No, it's not simple at all. You might not wish that anyone make $3 an hour, but neither do you have the ability to provide everyone in the world with jobs that pay more than $3 an hour. The argument from classical economics is not that low wages are good in themselves, but that the best system is where wages are set by the market, and wealth redistribution is done by the government and private charity.
> China is technically communist right? Shouldn't they be being taken care of by the state anyways?
They are not actually communist; they are an authoritarian state controlling a capitalist economy. They started down that path in the late 1970s under Deng Xiaopeng.
Before that, the state did a very poor job caring for its citizens. Millions died of starvation, persecution, and other ills. Look up the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, two government programs, as examples.
After that, probably never in the history of humanity have so many in a time and place escaped poverty as those who have in China. However, the country is so large that there are still many that are very poor.
But back in real life, while $3/hr may not be a lot compared to what some folks make, it's $3/hr more than someone making $0/hr makes, and it's triple what someone making $1/hr makes, and indeed a full 50% raise for anyone making $2/hr.
If I could wave a wand and give everyone who currently makes 0, 1 or 2/hr the skill set and the opportunity to suddenly make $3/hr, I'd be happy to do it. And the billions of people (hundreds of millions maybe?) who suddenly got (in their terms) a huge raise would be pretty happy about it too.