4 - The Michigan Daily - Tuesday, March 9, 2004 OPINION 420 MAYNARD STREET UVUe umn ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 opinion.mchigandail.conm tothedaily@michigandaily.com EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 JORDAN SCHRADER Editor in Chief JASON Z. PESICK Editorial Page Editor Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. NOTABLE QUOTABLE "Read what it says, and you will see the vision the Iraqi people have for themselves. And let there be no doubt in anyone's minds that it is a bright future." - Secretary of State Colin Powell, commenting on the signing of the interim Iraqi constitution, as reported by The Associated Press. MY T'sB TO INDIA toh 1 1TSIM ORL I~ 3.CA:L 4& NAI! H\4 a COLIN DALY THE MICHIGAN DALY Nllol" cdaig@a ufwioh.eck MOE wIth K tmos w le V~ Full Disclosure: opening the books on wages JESS PISKOR JOIN THE PISKOR 4 eople in the country and on this campus are obsessed with cost and price and wages. We bemoan our piddling internship salaries. We gripe about the cost of football tickets and the hike in the price of text- books. We look at rising tuition bills and then wonder why University President Mary Sue Coleman made $475,000 last year. When we apply for jobs, the thought is always in our heads: "Let's cut to the chase - how much will I get paid?" Well, let me suggest another thing we should wonder about: the wages of the factory work- ers who make the University-licensed apparel that we all wear. As I mentioned above, we know Coleman makes $475,000. We know Nike Chairman, President and CEO Phil Knight made $2.88 million last year. What we don't know is how much Knight pays his workers (safe guess: not enough). We don't know, and in fact, no one outside of Nike really knows. It is a mystery to the world, and it is of vital importance that we find out. The defenders of capitalism make grand claims that free-market forces will raise up all ships and that an unfettered market will create social justice. Informed consumers are necessary for the fulfillment of this promise. The logic of social justice via capitalism is that those buying goods make intelligent choices and reward those companies whose practices they support with their business, and punish those companies they do not by not buying their products. Clearly price is a major factor, but it cannot be the only one. Goods made using slavery would cost less, but hopefully consumers would not frequent such a business, taking their money to other stores with higher prices but with acceptable business practices. This idea is all well and good in theory. Companies with good labor practices should be rewarded, and those who use slaves in sweatshops should be punished. Unfortunately, as it stands today consumers are not informed shoppers and cannot know any company's labor practices. Some are uninformed out of their own desire to remain ignorant and not have to face the fact that their apparel was likely made in a sweatshop. Enlightened shoppers who search for companies whose practices deserve support, are also destined to igno- rance. These shoppers too are largely igno- rant, not by choice, but because corporations do not reveal important infor- mation about their products. There is hope; United Students Against Sweatshops, since 1998, has united universi- ties across the nation with workers in apparel factories to help ensure that corporations are held accountable for their actions. It is because of USAS and their affiliate on our campus, Students Organizing for Labor and Economic Equality, that university adminis- trators have enacted codes of conduct that set out guidelines for how corporations must behave if they want to use university logos. On our campus, SOLE staged a 51-hour sit- in in then-President Lee Bollinger's office in 1999 to force him to sign a code of conduct. In 2000, SOLE again forced the University to act by getting it to join the Worker's Rights Consortium, a nonprofit organization that inspects and issues reports on the working conditions in factories that make collegiate apparel. These codes and watchdog organizations already have improved the lives of workers around the globe, as pressure from campuses across the nation forced apparel makers like Nike to recognize unions in third-world sweatshops. Their success has not come easi- ly, however - up until recently, apparel mak- ers were unwilling to even disclose where their factories were. As far as Nike and other apparel manufactures were willing to admit, their clothes miraculously showed up pre- sewn on the racks at Foot Locker. That little tag on the back of the shirts may have said China, but that's as much information as any- one was likely to get. In partnership with a coalition of schools under the USAS banner, including the uni- versities of Wisconsin and Indiana and West- ern Michigan University, SOLE is readying a campaign for wage disclosure that would make companies that want to use our logo reveal how much they pay their workers or face losing our business. Once a database of worker pay levels across the globe is estab- lished, corporations can be held to local mini- mum-wage laws and it will be easier for groups like the WRC to enforce established laws against unfair labor practices. Our corporations cannot have it both ways. If they want international reputations, worldwide logo recognition and brand appeal, they need to open up their books and show consumers they are worth it. If capitalism is to ever begin to fulfill its promise of a better world, we need informed consumers today. Piskor can be reached at jpiskor@umich.edu. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 41 Exercising democracy protects rights TO THE DAILY: This letter is in response to a column written by Daniel Adams (The tyranny of the majority, 03/03/04). I always find it preposterous when people start off an article or, opinion with a little lie to get their readers' attention. This article doesn't seem to accept the belief in the democ- racy it claims to believe in, but rather a country under the rule of activist judges as the lawmak- ing body of our country. To others in main- stream America, we still feel the "people rule." After all, isn't this ideal the true meaning of our democracy? It is disturbing to me to know that people can make claims such as the one made in the article about trusting judges. Why then do the people elect the legislature? It is quite simple actually "to carry out the wishes of the people in making laws." Some people are so blinded by their hatred for people like myself who stand up and defend our principles by exercising our rights under the Constitution that they make claims that "direct democracy has crept back into the picture." When did it ever leave? It is not only the right of the people to dictate what happens in our government, but a duty to act to prevent giving constitutional rights to a panel of appointed judges. Then again, some people don't understand the difference between appointment and election. Let me explain it so you understand: The people rule by electing leg- islators to make the laws. The judges in most cases are appointed by the people we elect not to make new laws, but rather to knock down unconstitutional laws. Please, everybody feel free to give up your rights anyway or anytime you see fit, but don't for one second criticize the rights of others to exercise theirs. JESTON LA CROIX LSA sophomore Campus Coordinator Michigan Civil Rights Initiative Reader: Graduates should not feel entitled to jobs TO THE DAILY: After reading the past few articles from the tle check box on the University's application that stated, "Check here for great job upon grad- uation" because such a guarantee can never be made - plus, with the University's recent histo- ry, I think that application has caused enough trouble for one decade. Every. student's job in college is to work to the best of his or her abili- ties, try to network and gain experience and just keep his or her head up when it comes to employment upon graduation. To say that you don't want to "lower" yourself to a "shitty job" because of your education is to ignore the grow- ing pains that everyone must go through to be successful. Plus, rarely is your first job the one you keep for a sustained amount of time, and usually the final career one follows deviates from the concentration one had in school. So to the graduating seniors, I say don't lose hope in the job search, but also display a good sense of humility. Most of you are 20-something now, and you'll work well into your 50s and 60s, so if it takes you a few extra months to start on that trail, you probably won't begrudge it. MATTHEw DUANE Alum Department changes for AP credit based on content differences To THE DAILY: I'm writing in response to an article about the History Department's policy on Advanced Placement credits (Students look to review AP credit policies, 03/05/04). The article misrepre- sents the department's position, which I explained to reporter Nura Sediqe in a phone conversation: Our decision to no longer grant AP credit for specific history courses was not based on the opinion that high school AP class- es "do not match the rigor of the University's classes," as Sediqe writes, but rather on our judgment that the content of AP history courses is not substantially the same as that offered in our survey courses. We respect both the rigor and the strong intellectual content of high school AP history courses; they are very demanding classes and deserve the general uni- versity credit that is offered to those students who receive a high score on the AP test. SUSAN JUSTER History professor group, and they certainly are not representa- tive of each individual within it. Many members of YAF agree wholeheart- edly with letter writers John Wooster (Public opinion does not justify a constitutional mar- riage amendment, 03/050/4) and Max Ross (Reader: Where is the threat in gay mar- riage?, 03/05/04). Ross's opinion of the majority's view on gay marriage -"It does- n't bother me, so who cares if they get mar- ried"- is the view of many of our members. JON BOGUTH LSA sophomore YAF member JEREMY FERTNER Engineering freshman Campus director YAF 'U' should serve as training ground for faculty, administrators To THE DAILY: I disagree with the Daily's position that the University should not hire executive candi- dates "beckoned by the Ivy League" (The Earl of Emory, 03/08/04). The reality of the higher education hiring market is that Ivy League schools such as Columbia and Cornell univer- sities or private schools with mega-endow- ments such as Emory will always be viewed as preeminent destinations by university adminis- trators of promise. Money and prestige, two factors that most everyone's job criteria com- prise, are abundant on the aforementioned campuses, and while the Daily's suggestion to increase administrator salaries is appealing, it is also simplistic. An arms race with the Ivies and the Emorys of the world would be ill- advised - if not impossible - particularly while the University faces what seems like a perpetual budget crisis. Considering the lack of prestige held by the University relative to a school like Columbia, the University would seemingly have to overpay its administrators to compensate. The University should instead seek to attract the top administrative talent on the market, irrespective of a particular candi- date's career ambitions. While I cannot dis- count the benefits inherent in a lengthy ... i