The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy by Pietra Rivoli

In The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy, business professor Pietra Rivoli takes the reader on a fascinating around-the-world adventure to reveal the life story of her six-dollar T-shirt. Traveling from a West Texas cotton field to a Chinese factory, and from trade negotiations in Washington to a used clothing market in Africa, Rivoli examines international trade through the life story of this simple product. Her compelling story shows that both globalization's critics and its supporters have oversimplified the world of international trade.

Cotton had first become popular in England mainly because it was cooler and more comfortable than wool, plus it could be dyed in many colors and patterns. However, English manufacturers had to battle the Indian cotton textiles, which were much cheaper. Therefore, the British government enacted protectionist tariff and barriers against Indian cotton that allowed the infant British textile industry to grow and nourish. The United States did the same thing to grow its own textile industry in the northeastern part of the country. The U.S. government enacted tariffs to protect its infant industry against British textile imports, the textile industry sparked the Industrial Revolution in the U.S..

When America's cotton is sent to China, it is made into T-shirts in the sweatshops of China by laborers working 12-hour days and being paid subsistence wages. When the finished T-shirts re-enter the U.S., they are protected by the government through subsidies, tariffs, taxes, and protectionist policies that ensure that these foreign products will not provide too much competition to American-made shirts. Government regulations control how many T-shirt can be imported from various countrie...

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...d up in Salvation Army bins. The U.S. textile recycling industry enables Africans to dress well for very little money. In 2003, used clothing was by far America’s largest export to Tanzania, and it ranked fourth worldwide as a customer for America’s castoffs, with competition from countries such as Beijing, and the Republic of the Congo.”

I also find it interesting how Rivoli described the conditions of a garment worker. She described a child in Vietnam chained to a sewing machine without access to food or water, and spoke about a young girl from India who earned 18 cents per hour and is allowed to visit the bathroom only twice per day. This young girl lived in a room with 12 other girls; she shares a bed and only has gruel to eat. She is forced to work 90 hours each week, without overtime pay, and lives not only in poverty, but also in filth and sickness.