Fast fashion. It's convenient, it's cheap, and it's trending. When popular brands such as Shein, Zara, and Forever 21 are offering today’s must-have trends at extremely low prices, it’s difficult to justify why you would shop anywhere else. But would people feel differently if they were informed of the truth about the industry? Everybody has heard the rumors that fast fashion may not be the most sustainable, but many people do not know just how poorly the factory employees are being treated. The first red flag with these brands is how cheap they are selling the product. The fast-fashion companies market their brands as
having extremely low prices compared to most clothing stores. While the low prices are appealing for their customers, how is it possible for the companies to purchase the fabric, produce the clothing, pay the
workers fairly, and sustain healthy working conditions on such profit?
The short answer, it’s not. Most of these large companies have working factories in less fortunate countries, where they can get away with low wages and poor working conditions. Even if the workers are getting paid legal minimum wage, it is still 5 times less than what a person would need to be able to afford their bare minimum basic needs. Besides the poor wages, the workers often have to work extremely long hours, sometimes 15 hour days and 7 days a week. Because of their low wages, working overtime may be their only option for survival. Another way that these families make a living is by sending their children into poor-condition working factories. The large companies who are willing to have the young children work rather than raise the parent’s salary show just how greedy they can be to mass-produce their clothing at the lowest possible price. Since the children are too young to disagree with their parents or know right from wrong, they believe it is okay for them to be in factories mass-producing clothes for extremely low wages. Once people become aware of the inhumane treatment of the factory workers, the next step is how we can fix it. If people begin to shop second-hand more often and shop fast fashion less, then the large corporations will have to either make changes to their companies or shut them down. If the companies stop receiving business due to their working conditions, they will hopefully realize that they need to take action on improving their factory conditions, raising salaries, and putting an end to child labor.
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