USA

Alternet: Mad in the USA

More than 1,000 people attended a rally a few weeks ago in Connecticut
to demand fair trade and denounce the sweatshop buying habits of big
retailers like Wal-Mart. The speakers were passionate, the crowd pumped. But this
rally differed from the usual fair trade gatherings in one key respect:
It was not organized by labor, student, or environmental groups. It was
organized by an alliance of small and mid-sized manufacturers.

"The major retailers and big manufacturers are doing us in," explained
rally-organizer Fred Tedesco, owner of Pa-Ted Spring Co. in Bristol.
"They're destroying small- and medium-sized businesses. They're
destroying jobs. They're destroying the middle class. . . That's the dirty secret
of this whole thing."

Giant retail chains like Wal-Mart, Target, and Home Depot, have been
muscling large manufacturers to move their factories overseas,
primarily to China.The company does so much business in China
that it ranks as the country's 8th largest trading partner, ahead of Britain
and Russia.