Bay Area Garment Workers

If you see the tag "Made in America" on your clothing, you may want to think twice before deciding that it wasn't made in a sweatshop. I was surpised to learn that sweatshops still exist in America today. The inspiration for my website came from reading Shipler's chapter on immigrant workers in America. I was struck by how unfair it is that when a customer buys a one hundred dollar dress at a department store, only about six of those dollars actually go to the workers who produced the dress. After researching the apparel industry in the United States, I was disgusted by the way the top levels of the garment industry profit at the great expense of the garment workers who actually assemble the clothes. My website is devoted to garment workers in the Bay Area, and what it is like to live as a worker who is treated without dignity. I tried to show not only the terribly oppressive work conditions and ridiculously low wages that workers face, but also the issues that arrise from being a low wage, female, immigrant worker in the Bay Area. Living in Berkeley, I feel that the Bay Area, which is supposed to be a progressive place, should promote equality and a living wage. I was shocked by the amount of discrimination that still exists in my hometown area. However, I was also encouraged by the way many female immigrants in the Oakland garment industry have had the courage to speak out against the abuses that they face in the workplace, and within the entire apparel system. Visit my website to learn about the influence of Global Capitalism on the garment industry, an overview of sweatshops in America in recent years, and garment workers in the Bay Area today. Please check out my work at http://itrs.scu.edu/faculty/mbousquet/spring07/english2/cmallory_spr07/aahomepage3.htm