Wal-Mart Violation of Human Rights Free Essay Example

All around the world, consumers are buying from transnational companies such as Wal-Mart. Companies like Wal-Mart produce products that are created from different parts of the world. Wal-Mart is a company that uses cheap labor to get products made. Having cheap labour comes at a price; the sweatshops where some products are made violate human rights. Kathie Lee Gifford is an American singer and actress who produced a self-titled clothing line that was sold in Wal-Mart locations all around the world.

With the help of her celebrity status, lots of money was made from the production of these products. The Kathie Lee Gifford clothing line was produced in sweatshops located in Honduras. Consumers should boycott Wal-Mart because this transnational company violated human rights.

Wal-Mart violated the human rights of its workers in the sweatshops in Honduras. These workers, who are women as young as 12 years old, worked for a minimum of nine hours a day and more. For the long and hard hours they work, these young people often earned a minimum wage of thirty cents per hour.

For the people living in Honduras, it was a better life than what they had before, but it was still not enough to support their family. Many workers had unpaid forced overtime. For example, in 1996, one of the workers, Wendy Diaz stated in a press conference that the workers were forced to work almost every day. They also suffered from insults and violence from the armed guards in the sweatshops.

While the workers received an average wage of 30 cents, Kathie Lee Gifford was earning approximately ten million dollars per year from Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart was getting cheap and quick labour from the sweatshops in Honduras. Unfortunately, Kathie Lee did not know how her clothing line was being producing. After meeting Wendy Diaz, she appeared and testified in a legislation to stop the sweatshops. With human rights and labour union groups, she helped testify for a lawsuit for Wal-Mart to stop the unfair treatment of its workers.

Lots of money was made by Kathie Lee Gifford and Wal-Mart for selling these products, but the workers producing these products earned a very small fraction of what the product was worth. Wal-Mart is a company that violated the human rights of its workers. For many years, many workers had to face unfair treatment. Consumers should boycott Wal-Mart for all the human violations towards its workers. The price of cheap labor violated all of the basic needs and rights that everyone should have.

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