When Johnny came marching home after World War II, there were plenty of jobs waiting for him. Some veterans took advantage of the GI Bill and went to college; others got married, found work and bought a home in the suburbs. Either way, they all had a good future.
When Johnny came marching home after Korea, the job, housing and education possibilities were still top notch and veterans still had good choices they could make.
When Johnny came marching home after Vietnam, the climate was changing. The Vietnam War was very unpopular; draft dodging and the burning of draft cards were in vogue as America experienced a cultural revolution. There were no parades along Fifth Avenue welcoming home the veterans, and there were fewer jobs available. We began seeing something shameful: veterans of that war left destitute and homeless on the homefront.
From the 1970s on, the job market changed. Few noticed it at first, but America’s manufacturing and apparel-producing base was slowly eroding, and factories began moving overseas.
China was awakening from its communist cocoon and the “T-shirt phase” began. This has been described by NPR’s Adam Davidson as an “economic period in which there are a significant number of poor farmers who, rather than toil on unproductive land, accept harsh work conditions and low wages in textile and apparel factories.”
As time went on, the “T-shirt phase” spread to other Asian countries such as Japan, South Korean, Taiwan, Cambodia, India, Sri Lanka and-ironically-Vietnam. Large companies were lured out of the U.S. to these countries in the never-ending pursuit of cheap labor that equates to high profits for executives and low costs for goods.
Bangladesh is the latest Asian country to undergo the “T-shirt phase,” and the nation recently suffered an industrial disaster incredible by modern standards. Over 1,000 people died when an eight-story garment factory collapsed on Apr. 24.
The working conditions in that Bangladeshi factory were reminiscent of the sweatshops in New York City of the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a shoddy death trap constructed poorly and with little regard for the souls who came to work there every day to earn nickels on the dollar.
A movement is now afoot to convince high-end companies to improve the working conditions in Bangladesh, increase salaries and provide medical assistance. Undoubtedly, this would raise the price of the clothing and other products.
Such overseas reform would also destroy the large business incentive of moving industrial jobs out of the U.S. and across the Pacific. We have millions of unemployed people in America who could use a good paying job in a safe environment.
Again, these jobs used to be plentiful in Ridgewood and other parts of the country, and they’ve been lost over the last 40 years for the sake of profit. No one in any country should have to work in a sweatshop, so let’s encourage safer, humane labor standards around the world-but let’s also bring some jobs back to this country to help the army of our unemployed.
As Johnny-and now Jenny-come marching home from Iraq and Afghanistan to a country that doesn’t offer much in the way of employment, let’s give them the same opportunities that were given to past veterans-a good paying job that leads to a prosperous future. It’s the least we could do.
