THE BIG SECRET DEMOCRATS DO NOT WANT YOU TO KNOW:
Obama blames GOP for Democrats' economic disasters
How the 2008 Financial Crisis Still Affects You
Survey: Over One-Third of Small Businesses Could Not Pay Rent in October
Over one-third of U.S. small business owners could not pay their rent in full or on time in October.
Rent delinquency was already at a six-month low at 30 percent in September, but that figure has now increased by seven points to 37 percent, according to small business referral network Alignable.
Small business owners taking the survey attributed high delinquency rates to increasing rent prices, inflation, recessionary fears, high gas prices, supply chain issues, and labor expenses.
Furthermore, 59 percent of small businesses observed that consumers are spending less.
Across different small business sectors, 49 percent of restaurant owners said they could not pay rent in October, compared to 36 percent who struggled the month before. Restaurants reported seeing fewer customers eat out due to declining disposable income.
Other sectors with high rates of rent delinquency in October include education at 57 percent, auto at 49 percent, transportation at 46 percent, and retail at 43 percent.
A “Store For Rent” sign at a storefront on Third Avenue in New York, US, on Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2022. (Amir Hamja/Bloomberg via Getty)
For auto companies, failure to pay rent increased by 21 points from September to October. Small business owners attribute this to the supply chain crisis increasing the price of metals and products, combined with a scarcity of inventory. Consumers are also hesitant to purchase vehicles during recessionary times.
Small businesses in seven different states said they failed to pay rent in full or on time, including Massachusetts at 51 percent, New Jersey at 49 percent, New York at 45 percent, California at 44 percent, Pennsylvania at 44 percent, Florida at 39 percent, and Texas at 38 percent.
However, in some states, rent delinquency went decreased from the previous month, such as Illinois and Ohio — going down seven and nine points, respectively.
The survey results were based on a poll of 4,789 small business owners from October 15 to October 27 conducted by Alignable.
Overall inflation has surged under the Biden administration, climbing 8.2 percent since last year, while economists warn that a recession may loom within the next year as the Federal Reserve is expected to increase interest rates several more times and then keep rates elevated throughout next year.
You can follow Ethan Letkeman on Twitter at @EthanLetkeman.
BIDENOMICS TRICKLE UP ECONOMICS
Tens of millions of working people confront the daily reality of a struggle to maintain their standard of living in the face of corporate profit gouging, job cutting and relentless inflation. There is a growing wave of strikes, largely in rebellion against the oppressive weight of the trade unions, which seek to suppress the class struggle.
20 Retailers Are Melting Down Right In Front Of Our Eyes
Big oil, food giants, restaurant chains reap windfall profits as US real wages plunge
With one week remaining before the US midterm elections, President Joe Biden has taken to denouncing the oil monopolies for “war profiteering” and price-gouging. On Monday, he took time out from traveling around the country to boost the faltering campaigns of Democratic House and Senate members and candidates for state offices to attack the record profits reported last week by oil and gas companies as “outrageous” and threaten the imposition of an excess profit tax.
“It’s time for these companies to stop war profiteering, meet their responsibilities to this country, give the American people a break and still do very well,” he told reporters at the White House.
It is all too obvious that Biden’s bluster against corporate profit-gouging is prompted by polls showing that soaring prices for basic necessities is the biggest concern driving voters in elections that may very well shift control of one or both chambers of Congress, as well as much of the country’s electoral machinery, to Trump’s fascistic Republicans.
Nobody knows better than Biden that there is no possibility of getting an excess profits tax through Congress, even should it remain under Democratic control.
The oil magnates responded contemptuously to Biden’s threat. Mike Sommers, president of the American Petroleum Institute, stated, “Rather than taking credit for price declines and shifting blame for price increases, the Biden administration should get serious about addressing the supply-and-demand imbalance that has caused higher gas prices and created long-term energy challenges.”
In other words, it should lift the minimal restraints on the fossil fuel industry and give it an even freer rein to pollute and profit from the impact of the US-NATO war against Russia.
Last Friday, Exxon Mobil and Chevron, the largest US oil companies, reported record or near-record profits for the July-September quarter of 2022. Exxon’s profit of nearly $20 billion was a record for any quarter and 10 percent higher than the previous record, set the quarter before. Chevron’s profit of $11.2 billion was slightly less than the previous quarter’s record amount.
On Thursday, the two biggest European producers, Shell and TotalEnergies, reported that their profits had more than doubled from the third quarter of 2021.
The five biggest oil companies took in more than $50 billion in profits in the second quarter of this year, and the International Energy Agency reported that the net income of the world’s oil and gas producers will double this year from last to a record $4 trillion. “Today’s high fossil fuel prices have generated an unprecedented windfall for producers,” the agency stated.
Rather than using some of their windfall profits to reduce prices or increase production, the oil giants have raised dividends and carried out massive stock buybacks to enrich their big investors. On Friday, Exxon Mobil raised its stock dividend, citing its commitment to “return excess cash” to shareholders.
Biden has released some 165 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and prices at the pump have receded in recent weeks from their previous highs, but they remain more than 13 percent higher than at the end of 2021.
The energy industry is not alone in taking advantage of the inflationary spiral, rooted in decades of central bank handouts to Wall Street and exacerbated by supply chain disruptions triggered by US-NATO proxy war against Russia in Ukraine, to reap windfall profits.
The New York Times on Monday reported that major food companies and restaurant chains have driven up their profits by charging the public far more than what was needed to cover their increased costs.
The article noted that over the past year, the price of food eaten at home has increased 13 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Basic staples have risen far more than the 8.2 percent year-over-year increase in the Consumer Price Index.
Cereals and bakery goods are up 16.2 percent. Dairy products have shot up by 15.9 percent.
A dozen eggs that could have been purchased for $1.83 in 2021 now cost $2.17.
Meanwhile, the profits of major food companies have risen even faster than the prices they charge. Last month, PepsiCo, whose prices for drinks and chips were up 17 percent from year-earlier levels, reported that its third-quarter profit grew by more than 20 percent. Coca-Cola reported a profit increase of 14 percent from the previous year.
Many restaurant chains are likewise reaping super-profits on the basis of inflated prices. The Times article focused on Chipotle Mexican Grill, which reported that its prices by the end of 2022 would be nearly 15 percent higher than a year earlier. It reported a nearly 28 percent increase in its profits in the latest quarter as compared to the same quarter last year.
The newspaper quoted Kyle Herrig, president of advocacy group Accountable.Us as saying, “The [earnings] calls tell us corporations have used inflation, the pandemic and supply chain challenges as an excuse to exaggerate their own costs and then nickel and dime consumers.”
Housing costs are likewise soaring, further eroding workers’ purchasing power. According to the latest report on inflation, issued last month by the BLS, the cost of renting a primary residence rose this year by 7.2 percent through September, more than double the usual annual increase of around 3 percent.
The average 30-year fixed-rate mortgage has topped 7 percent, due mainly to the rapid increase in interest rates imposed by the Federal Reserve to slow down economic growth and drive up unemployment—a central component of the ruling class war against workers’ wage struggles. This is the highest mortgage rate since the Great Recession of 2008.
With the national median asking price for a home at $435,050—itself prohibitive for most workers—mortgage payments today are nearly $1,000 a month higher than in August of 2021.
Biden’s feigned outrage over corporate price- and profit-gouging cannot conceal the fact that his administration is working relentlessly with the trade union apparatuses to impose the full inflationary impact of the war in Ukraine, for which the White House and Congress have already allotted over $50 billion, on the working class. With the support of both big business parties, Biden has joined with the rail and West Coast dock workers’ union leaderships to block 22,000 longshoremen and 120,000 railroaders, who have voted overwhelmingly to strike and rejected pro-company contracts, to exercise their right to strike.
The result has been a devastating decline in the real earnings of US workers.
Last month, the BLS reported that real hourly and weekly earnings for all employees decreased 0.1 percent from August to September, seasonally adjusted. Year over year, real hourly earnings fell 3 percent, while real weekly earnings declined even more, 3.9 percent, due to a decrease in the average workweek.
According to a study released in October by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, the decline in real wages for US workers is even more severe. The authors of the study wrote:
We find that a majority of employed workers’ real (inflation-adjusted) wages have failed to keep up with inflation in the past year. For these workers, the median decline in real wages is a little more than 8.5 percent. Taken together, these outcomes appear to be the most severe faced by employed workers over the past 25 years…
While the past 25 years have witnessed episodes that show either a greater incidence or larger magnitude of real wage declines, the current time period is unparalleled in terms of the challenge employed workers face.
Twitter staff have been told to work 84-hour weeks and managers slept at the office over the weekend as they scramble to meet Elon Musk's tight deadlines, reports say
Twitter managers have told some staff work 12-hour shifts, seven days a week, CNBC reported.
Some managers told The New York Times they slept at Twitter's office on Friday and Saturday nights.
Staff are trying to prove themselves amid the looming threat of layoffs under new owner Elon Musk.
Staff at Twitter have been clocking up much longer hours than usual since Elon Musk took over, CNBC reported. This comes as staff face the looming threat of layoffs amid the tech mogul's planned overhaul of the company.
Twitter managers have told some staff to work 12-hour shifts, seven days a week — equivalent to 84 hours a week — to meet Musk's deadlines, CNBC reported, citing internal communications.
Musk's $44 billion purchase of the social-media platform went through on Thursday evening, but concerns about layoffs at the company have been swirling since well before that. It remains unclear how many staff will be laid off and when, as well as which teams will be most affected.
Since Friday, staff at the company have been set tasks which some see as a test by Musk's team to see who works hard.
Insider previously reported that Musk's team assigned some of Twitter's engineers coding projects to work on over the weekend, known as sprints. Other tasks include making major changes to Twitter's verification service.
Insider previously reported that an internal message was sent to Twitter staff working on changes to the company's verification process telling them that: "The expectation is literally to work 24/7 to get this out."
CNBC reported that staff haven't been told whether they'll get overtime pay, time off in lieu, or job security for working on the assignments.
Staff worry that their careers at Twitter could be over if they don't complete their tasks by the early November deadlines, CNBC reported.
Twitter's managers, meanwhile, have been asked to carry out performance reviews and send Musk's team lists of which employees should be kept on, people familiar with the discussions told Insider.
But the managers themselves are also feeling the strain, with some telling The New York Times that they slept at Twitter's office on Friday and Saturday nights.
Twitter's top managers were pulled into meetings with Musk and his team last week at Twitter's San Francisco headquarters, where they were asked to describe their division's work, two people involved in the meetings told The Times.
Some Twitter managers told the publication that they felt like they were being assessed.
The Washington Post reported that Musk's team plans to cut around a quarter of Twitter's staff in a first round of layoffs, citing a person familiar with discussions that took place at Twitter HQ last week.
Twitter didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment on working hours, staff sleeping at the office, and layoffs.
Musk dissolved Twitter's board of directors, a Monday SEC filing shows, cementing his position as Twitter's sole director.
Do you work for Twitter? Or have you been affected by the layoffs? Contact this reporter at gdean@insider.com using a non-work email.
Read the original article on Business Insider
IS AMAZON MORE DESTRUCTIVE THAN WALMART???
15 Facts That Show Amazon Is Destroying America
AREN'T THE POOR PEOPLE WHO WORK AT WALMART A KIND OF SLAVE CLASS?
THE WALTON FAMILY ARE CHINA'S BIGGEST IMPORTERS OF CHINESE CRAP!
Chinese Exports to U.S. from Uyghur Slave Region Nearly Triple Year-on-Year
Chinese customs data reviewed by the South China Morning Post (SCMP) on Tuesday showed exports from the Xinjiang region to the United States nearly tripled year-on-year in September 2022, despite tougher scrutiny for forced labor imposed by the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA).
The UFLPA, which was passed in December 2021 and went into effect in June 2022, effectively assumes all products from Xinjiang are tainted with slavery from the oppressed Uyghur Muslims and challenges importers to prove otherwise.
The Chinese government, which denounces all accounts of its abuse of the Uyghurs as “vicious lies” no matter how well-documented they are, was infuriated by the UFLPA and predicted it would cause massive disruptions to supply chains for goods such as cotton and solar panels. Textile companies in particular said it would be difficult to prove cotton sourced to Xinjiang was not tainted by slave labor.
That script began flipping in September, as Chinese state media boasted of record exports from the Uyghur region despite the UFLPA, while Republican lawmakers demanded to know what methods U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) was using to screen imports from Xinjiang. Congress was especially concerned about high-demand minerals with notoriously opaque supply chains.
The SCMP reported on Tuesday that exports fell by more than half in September after a summer surge, due to the slowing Chinese economy and weakening overseas demand – but at $21.05 million in value, they were still double the totals from June, when the UFLPA went into effect, and nearly three times the export volume from September 2021:
According to Chinese customs data, the top individual product Xinjiang exported to the US last month was 8 million pairs of synthetic socks worth US$1.56 million, followed by Christmas products valued at US$1.51 million.
Machinery and mechanical equipment remained the top category of products from Xinjiang shipped to the US last month, accounting for 28.9 per cent, according to calculations by the Post based on trade data.
That was followed by apparel and clothing, accounting for 11.6 per cent and worth US$2.4 million, compared with over US$9 million in August. Both have been flagged by US officials as high-risk sectors subject to the most scrutiny under the Uygur Forced Labor Prevention Act.
These soaring totals, revealed a few weeks later than usual because China delayed economic reporting during the Communist Party National Congress, came despite CBP claims that it has halted 491 shipments worth $158.6 million due to suspicion the goods were tainted by forced labor.
The SCMP noted CBP is also running behind on its quarterly data release for reasons unknown and did not offer details about the shipments it ostensibly blocked under the UFLPA.
“There are going to be some rough spots along the way, but I think we’ve been off to a remarkably good start,” CBP commissioner Chris Magnus told Bloomberg News last week.
“We’re seeing good examples of compliance so far. When you start to have some success stories, business starts to become more comfortable that there’s a way to work with this act and [with] the issue of forced labor in general,” he said.
“Ultimately this comes down to, the American public wants this,” Magnus said. “The consciousness has, by and large, been raised about this issue. People want to buy products that they can feel confident are not made with forced labor.”
U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) undersecretary Robert Silvers, who chairs an interagency forced labor task force, told the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) in late September that DHS regards the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act as one of the most important trade laws on the books.
“When it comes to corporate compliance programs, boards of directors need to be focused on this, CEOs need to be focused on this, compliance teams certainly need to be laser focused on this,” he said.
“We are committing a lot of resources to this,” he said. “At present, this is a high commitment area, a high priority area. We do need more resources and our department looks forward to working with Congress to ensure appropriate resourcing for forced labor enforcement. But we are strongly enforcing this new law right now, with significant resources committed to it.”
Magnus and Silvers’ comments seem incongruous with the enormous surge in Xinjiang exports reported by the SCMP, especially since import companies have said the new law is very difficult for them to comply with, particularly for cotton and polysilicates.
The World Uyghur Congress (WUC), an international coalition of exiled Uyghur activists, filed suit against the British government on Tuesday for not doing enough to prevent the importation of cotton tainted with “slave labor.”
The WUC noted that 85 percent of China’s cotton is sourced to Xinjiang, and “putting internment camp detainees to work in factories is a Xinjiang-wide policy,” so a much larger volume of exports from the region should be subjected to tight scrutiny.
The British government responded that it has limited authority to investigate imports unless there is a clear connection between “alleged criminality” and a “specific product.”
Meanwhile, the European Union is considering a law similar to the UFLPA that would ban imports “for which forced labor has been used at any stage of their production, manufacture, harvest and extraction.”
Is Wal-Mart Good for America? (full documentary) | FRONTLINE
Report: Walmart, GM Lobby U.S. to Hide Import Data that Could Reveal Slave, Child Labor (MORE BOTTOM)
FUK THEM AND THE BILLIONAIRE WALTON FAMILY!
THERE WAS A TIME WHEN WALMART USED ILLEGALS TO CLEAN THEIR STORES. THEY LOCKED THEM IN AT NIGHT. ANYTHING TO AVOID PAYING LIVING WAGES.
ALL 'CHEAP' LABOR IS HEAVILY SUBSIDIZED BY MIDDLE AMERICA!
15 Reasons Why Walmart Is The Worst Company In America
VIDEO
20 Signs Of The Staggering Decline Of The American Middle Class Family
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHc3TS2JFzU
We just got more evidence that the middle class is being systematically destroyed in America. At this point, millions of people out there have already grown accustomed to barely scraping by from month to month. But that is not what being “middle class” is supposed to be about. Middle-class families should be able to make more money than they have to spend on everyday necessities because is only by doing so that they can build long-term wealth. Unfortunately, income growth has not kept up with the pace of the rising cost of living, and millions of households have taken massive amounts of debt. At the same time, the labor market doesn't offer good-paying jobs that support middle-class life, and the lack of these positions has been contributing to the decline of this income group all across the country. In the early 1970s, the middle class accounted for around 60 percent of the population, but now middle-income households are rapidly becoming a minority in the United States. And as economic conditions continue to deteriorate, millions of hard-working families all over America are being stretched financially like never before. “In America, the middle class can no longer afford retirement. Middle-class Americans face sharp economic inequality, with ownership of financial assets highly concentrated among the wealthy,” explained Tyler Bond, NIRS research manager. “Now that we have a retirement system largely built around the individual ownership of financial assets in 401(k) accounts, middle-class Americans are struggling to accumulate sufficient financial assets during their working years. This means the retirement outlook for many in the middle class is bleak at best.” Since the onset of the health crisis, the U.S. economy has been decaying at an alarming pace. Over the past two years, the middle class has gotten smaller and smaller in this country, and now it seems that another economic downturn is upon us once again. So many families are already living on the edge right now. Recent surveys have exposed that well over 50% of the population is living paycheck to paycheck and that most Americans don't have emergency savings or a financial cushion to fall back on. When you are living on the edge, there is always a danger that you could fall over. Since 2020, we have never seen so many middle-class Americans falling straight into poverty. In other words, unless dramatic changes happen in America, the middle class is going to be absolutely eviscerated in the next decade. We must wake up now. The middle class is dying right before our eyes, and if we want to save it, we must take action now. Today, we compiled a series of new numbers that expose the rapid downfall of the U.S. middle-class.
It's Too Late To Stop This Now, Get Your House In Order
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u7173SPBF8
15 Signs That The Social Decay In America Is Worse Than It Has Ever Been Before
The social fabric of the United States is rapidly deteriorating. Right now, virtually any measure of social welfare is showing us that social decay in America is accelerating at a very shocking pace. Our main institutions are either being dismantled or falling apart. At the same time, civil disorder continues to trigger unprecedented chaos in several parts of our country. Millions of Americans don't have access to proper housing, food, and education, and the gap between the 'haves' and the 'have-nots' has never been wider. The lack of proper education to help Americans thrive and accomplish financial stability is another sign of societal breakdown. Most colleges and universities are failing in one of their most basic missions: to equip students with the tools they need for a career. Millions of students graduate each year totally ill-prepared to earn a living and pay off the debt they’ve accumulated getting their degrees — at least 40% of those who start college don’t finish within six years. Despite these problems, colleges continue to raise tuition and to pay for these ever-increasing costs, students are borrowing more money and taking on more and more debt. And with federal loans accounting for much of the $1.5 trillion in outstanding student loan debt, and more than a million people defaulting on their loans, taxpayers are picking up much of the tab for this broken system while our younger generations remain utterly unprepared for the challenges of adult life. In the world’s wealthiest country, more and more people are living on the streets. Homelessness is a significant indicator of social decay. There are 750,000 Americans who are homeless on any given night, with one in five of them considered chronically homeless. Around 70% of the homeless are individuals, and families with children make up for the remaining 30%. Living without proper access to housing puts many people in very a vulnerable position, oftentimes, their lives are at risk. An examination of 20 US urban areas found that around 13,000 homeless people are victimized by disease, extreme weather, and substance abuse every year. The number of victims shot up by 77% in the five years ending in 2020. Today, the average life expectancy of a homeless person in America is just 50 years. There will be no future for us if we stay on this highly self-destructive path. The choices that we make individually and collectively as a nation are critical for the health of our society. Throughout all human history, great empires have fallen because societies have consistently made the wrong choices. So if we want to prevent the downfall of America, we must start making better choices. But if we are going to change direction, we better start doing it now because time is running out, and it won’t be too long before it is gone completely. Today, we decided to expose some worrying facts about the social breakdown happening all around us.
VIDEOS:
Why New York’s Billionaires’ Row Is Half Empty
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wehsz38P74g&t=1439s
15 Signs That America Is In Much Worse Trouble Than We All Thought
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bafVveN1qlc
Today, we brought you some numbers that may be hard to digest. Even though most of us know by now that America is in trouble, many people out there don't have any idea of how deep in trouble we really are. Offense rates are shooting up tremendously right now. As the cost of basic necessities escalates, more people are stealing to feed themselves today than in any other period in the past decade. Gas theft rates are skyrocketing, as prices rise above the $5-dollar-mark. Since January, the number of carjackings has gone up by over 300% in some cities. Officers say that it's not just a few gallons being siphoned from vehicles. Now, thieves are pumping thousands of dollars' worth of fuel from gas stations and selling it for a profit. CNN reported that, in Orlando, Florida, authorities are looking for two people who they say stole more than 1,000 gallons of fuel from a gas station. In Las Vegas, Nevada, highly modified vehicles are being used to steal tens of thousands of gallons from local gas stations. And in Greenville, South Carolina, several arrests for gas thefts have been made since January. Last week, in North Carolina last week, almost 400 gallons of gas were stolen by thieves who were able to bypass the payment system. The list goes on and on, and given that gas prices are expected to continue to rise, we’re going to see many more similar cases happening until the end of the year.
Meanwhile, on dividedness, the U.S. ranks No. 1. A Pew Research Center Survey of 20 developed nations found that Americans were the most likely to say their society was split along partisan, racial, and ethnic lines. The U.S. also reported more religious division than almost any other country surveyed. The truth is that our country is rapidly falling apart. Since the 1970s, economic inequality in the U.S. has skyrocketed, leaving many Americans living paycheck to paycheck while the nation’s top earners hoard all the gains from economic growth. It's actually been 11 years since the last federal minimum wage hike, the longest span the baseline wage has gone without an increase since it began in 1938. Since the last federal minimum wage hike — to $7.25 an hour, starting July 24, 2009 — the cost of living has shot up by 20%, while the price of essentials such as housing and health care have increased even faster. The average rent back in 2009 was about $1,132, adjusted for inflation. On top of all that, the U.S. manufacturing sector is facing a historic slowdown right now, which is quite alarming given that about 12% of the nation’s total output comes from manufacturing. And the supply chain disruptions we’ve seen so far are just a hint of the chaos we are going to witness this year. As we enter peak shipping season, shipping information company Frieghtos estimates that by August the price to ship one 40-ft container from China to the US East Coast will shoot up to more than $20,000, almost twice as high as shipping rates were in January, and a 500% increase from 2019 levels. Our living standards are decaying and, at this point, we all can see our quality of life evaporating right before our eyes. That's why we compiled some sobering statistics that reveal that the crises we're facing are far more severe than most of us imagine. For more info, find us on: https://www.epiceconomist.com/ And visit: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/
Prepare for the EVICTION WAVE about to hit US Housing Market (13 MILLION NOW IN DEFAULT)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-XhzvHUgB0
Why New York’s Billionaires’ Row Is Half Empty
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wehsz38P74g&t=1439s
Report: Walmart, GM Lobby U.S. to Hide Import Data that Could Reveal Slave, Child Labor
The Associated Press (AP) reported Tuesday that a coalition of major U.S. companies, including Walmart and General Motors, is quietly lobbying the government to make certain import data confidential — a change that would make it much more difficult for journalists and human rights activists to link imported goods to abusive labor practices abroad, including forced labor in China’s Xinjiang province and child labor in Africa.
Human rights lawyer Martina Vandenberg called the closed-door proposals “outrageous” and said American corporations should be “ashamed that their answer to this abuse is to end transparency.”
“Curtailing access to this information will make it harder for the public to monitor a shipping industry that already functions largely in the shadows,” agreed University of British Columbia professor Peter Klein, a prominent analyst of global supply chains.
In essence, the corporate executives who make up the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee proposed “modernizing” import/export procedures in a variety of ways, one of which would make “data collected from vessel manifests confidential.”
This would frustrate the current practice of journalists using shipping manifests to determine where goods manufactured or harvested with abusive labor practices were sent, a key tactic in pressuring U.S. companies to stop allowing forced labor into their supply chains.
As the AP pointed out, this seems directly contrary to CBP’s commitment to “boost visibility into global supply chains, support ethical sourcing practices and level the playing field for domestic U.S. manufacturers.” Corporate public relations departments have also been assuring American consumers they wish to cleanse their supply chains of forced labor and child labor.
The advisory committee suggested making customs data confidential would protect American businesses from data theft, which has become “more commonplace, severe, and consequential.”
The AP noted the committee also proposed rules that would require CBP to give advance notice to importers when it suspects they have purchased goods produced through abusive labor practices, a seemingly reasonable request that could imperil whistleblowers because abusive suppliers could be tipped off about complaints and investigations.
Labor activists complain tracking down and prosecuting abuse is already extremely difficult. Some seemingly clear-cut, high-profile lawsuits have been dismissed by judges because the evidence was not airtight enough. On the other hand, importers complain that lawsuits are fantastically expensive and can take years to resolve.
The U.S. Department of Labor in late September announced new initiatives to crack down on forced and child labor, including new reports identifying some of the most problematic regions of the world.
Both U.S. and international analysts believe abusive labor practices have grown more widespread over the past few years. The latest edition of the Labor Department’s list of goods tainted with child or forced labor added 32 more items to a roster that already included 158 products from 77 countries.
One of the top headlines in the struggle against labor abuses was the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), which took effect in June 2022. The UFLPA effectively assumes all products from China’s Xinjiang province, which the indigenous population call East Turkistan, are tainted by labor coerced from the Uyghur Muslims and other oppressed minorities, challenging importers to prove otherwise.
Xinjiang is by no means the only area of concern in the world. Another is the alleged use of child labor in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to mine cobalt, a mineral in high demand for use in rechargeable batteries. Many of the estimated 40,000 children employed in DRC cobalt mining are reportedly digging with their bare hands.
Another industry of great concern is acai berry harvesting in Brazil. Acai berries, which have become one of the most popular “superfoods” for their pleasing taste and antioxidant qualities, grow near the top of South American palm trees that can exceed 60 feet in height. Adults are too heavy to reach the fragile tops of these trees, so children are tasked with climbing their trunks and using saw blades to cut the berries loose.
This practice is every bit as dangerous as it sounds, especially since venomous snakes and insects infest the dense forests, along with quite a few venomous people. Poor local families are willing to risk their children for low wages in an almost completely unregulated industry to obtain the berries, even though the injury rate for tree-climbers is horrific, and repeatedly climbing the trees can actually stunt a child’s growth.
Numerous complaints have been filed against Zimbabwe’s gold mining industry for using child labor, and many of the mines are owned by Chinese companies that have been accused of severely abusing local employees. Independent or “artisanal” gold mining, which sees desperately poor families sending young children to pan for gold along river banks, is illegal in Zimbabwe, but the practice is so widespread that the authorities cannot control it.
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