Commercial Policy in The Books Store

In this comprehensive look at the real, human toll of America's unsound trade policy, Senator Byron Dorgan exposes the myth of "free trade." Indeed, free trade is not free; it is something that is slowly but surely draining away American prosperity. Sure, Chinese labor can drive down prices at Wal-Mart; at the same time, however, those saved wages-dollars that would have gone to buy these cheaper goods-are gone. Too soon, it will all come crashing down.

Major U.S. corporations continue to ship jobs overseas by the millions and, because of their influence in Washington, avoid paying a king's ransom in taxes. Many billions of dollars that these companies fleece from the government and the American people go overwhelmingly to investments in expanding production capabilities overseas. In short, our government is in the grip of corporate and foreign interests, and the American worker has born the brunt of this culture of corruption. How can we stem the tide of outsourcing? Why has the White House done nothing? Will the middle class survive?

Labor rights have traditionally been a concern of labor law scholars and practitioners whose work concentrates exclusively on domestic developments. In the past decade, however, the globalization of investment and production has expanded the bounds of labor rights discourse.

Contributors to this volume provide the first comprehensive view of labor rights in the international system of commerce. They consider the avenues open to worker rights claims in the global economy under international human rights instruments, U.S. trade laws, free trade agreements, labor rights litigation, and corporate codes of conduct. They address worker rights from the standpoints of human rights concerns, trade and development policy, and labor law principles.