While quality goods can be made in many countries, and there is a measure of logic in moving production offshore, there is a downside to this.
And it is not only the quality of the goods that is relevant.
In many cases, Third World countries produce goods that are immensely cheaper than those from Western nations because the workers are exploited and abused.
It is worth inquiring after the conditions under which such cheaper goods are produced, since purchasing these goods amounts to approval of inhumane working conditions.
When South Africa underwent its transformation from the apartheid regime, the new government was under immense pressure to join in the trend of globalisation. Protective import tariffs were abolished without regard to whether certain imports perhaps ought to be subjected to such tariffs because of unfair competition, dumping, or the use of slave labour.
The nett result has been the collapse of the South African textile industry and the flooding of the South African market with goods of questionable origin.
There is a racial aspect to this matter as well. Most of the textile factories employed Coloured and Indian workers, rather than black people.
Unemployment in these communities has soared as a result, but the government, dominated by black people, has treated them with disdain.
Regards,
Mike