• LaLuzDelSol@lemmy.world
    12·
    6 months ago

    I feel like a lot people on Lemmy, and people in left-leaning spaces in general, kind of have a blind spot on this one. People get that buying local is good, but not buying American.

    It matters where your money goes. People complain about the soullessness of modern American life, and how hard it is to find a good job, and how democracies are backsliding around the globe, and then they buy things from China that are cheaply made and, at most, slightly better value in the long run.

    This isn’t me trying to be nationalist or xenophobic but whenever anyone (including me because there’s no way to completely avoid it nowadays) buys Chinese goods you are supporting a government that is aggressively un-democratic, that actively supports Russia, and also has basically zero labor laws and an absolutely enormous wealth gap between the ruling class and the working class.

    And yeah I get a lot of Americans are hurting right now due to inflation but the solution isn’t to send money overseas. The best thing you can do for your neighbor is buy union and buy American.

    • billgamesh@lemmy.ml
      7·
      6 months ago

      Voting with your dollar is a myth (it’s a myth that workers have any vote, not that the dollar controls the imperial core). China offering a viable alternative to not being able to afford cars because companies have arbitrarily inflated prices is great. Arbitrarily spending a lot more money that will mostly go to shareholders in the US is not going to help the worker

      • LaLuzDelSol@lemmy.world
        1·
        6 months ago

        Voting with your dollar is a myth? So if the IDF (or ISIS, if you prefer) drops an amazing new EV for $10k, with all money going straight to weapons procurement, you’d buy it?

        • billgamesh@lemmy.ml
          3·
          6 months ago

          Very much a strawman argument. China can offer cheap electric cars because they aren’t paying american car company CEOs. Also, your argument supposes that American manufacturers aren’t supporting IDF…

      • MeaanBeaan@lemmy.world
        3·
        6 months ago

        Yes, let’s try to pick apart the one hyperbolic statement he made and completely ignore all of his other valid points. Let’s also link a very biased article about Wikipedia that has absolutely nothing to do with anything as some sort of proof that China is some bastion for workers rights. It’s not like they literally force people into labor camps simply for being minorities or anything.

        The US is far from perfect but let’s not pretend they somehow have worse labor rights than freaking China.

      • SeattleRain@lemmy.world
        3·
        6 months ago

        Their labor conditions are significantly worse than modern American work conditions let’s not kid ourselves. Although this never bothers people when it comes to goods made in Mexico.

    • Maggoty@lemmy.world
      5·
      6 months ago

      Buying local/national is fine when the quality is there. But I’m not putting my face into a grinder just to bail out American corporations.

    • Fidel_Cashflow@lemmy.ml
      4·
      6 months ago

      also has basically zero labor laws and an absolutely enormous wealth gap between the ruling class and the working class.

      China’s congress literally just passed a law a few days ago requiring all companies over 100 employees to have employee councils as a mandatory organ of the company structure

      Article 17(2) of the Revised Company Law now stipulates that the assembly of employee representatives shall be the basic form of the democratic corporate governance system and that this shall apply to all companies. That means, regardless of whether a company is private or state-owned, whether it is a limited liability or a stock corporation. This is a notable development, as democratic corporate governance as a requirement for all companies is set out in national law for the first time.

      An Employee Assembly shall be convened at least once a year, and more than two-thirds of the employee representatives must be present at the plenary session of an Employee Assembly. Elections and votes on relevant matters at an Employee Assembly require a majority of all employee representatives.

    • Heavybell@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      6 months ago

      “Buying American” would be exporting money for me, and there’s no domestic car manufacturing anymore. So I’m sending money overseas no matter what I buy, and it’s probably all made in China anyway… :P