Wages reported to be paid by a Lahore, Pakistan factory in 2007-2008 for a month of 48-hour work weeks making Econscious brand t-shirts: 4600 rupees a month (equivalent to US $77 a month)
Cost of a month’s rent for a family to live in a fly-infested Lahore, Pakistan slum with sewage running down the street, according to a UNHCR report: 7500 rupees
Range of wholesale cost-per-shirt for Econscious shirts when bought in cases of 72 in the United States, according to Lifework Industries: $4.60 – $5.85 a shirt
Base price at which print-on-demand retailer CafePress sells Econscious a single men’s or women’s t-shirt: $22.99
Additional markup added by StreamStone as profit for each shirt, in compensation for adding the word “ethnomusicologist” to the front of the shirt: $5.00
Final sale price for Econscious “ethnomusicologist” t-shirt: $27.99
the only fill in the blank there is how many shirts per month? assuming a low 1 shirt per minute, and our US standard of labor, 8 hour day / 20 day month, the laborer produces almost 10,000 shirts per month. retailing for a total of almost $270k
almost 3,500 times more than the workers were paid.
Daniel,
Thanks for writing.
I do not know what the rate of shirt production is in these factories. If you know of a good source for that information — or at least an industry standard — I’d be grateful if you could share it.
The Pakistani full time rate for earning the minimum wage of 4600 rupees (in the winter of 2007-2008, the period for which I have documentation) is for a 48 hour workweek, not the US standard of a 40 hour workweek.
I think Econscious needs to remain itself Ensultingourintellgence.
unEthicalbastards