Slavery Footprint.

One of my brothers is a middle school history teacher. He recently returned from a continuing ed program in the Washington DC area that focused on President Lincoln and slavery. Much of this was showcased on his blog- declaration address and dream. But one post  (scroll up) asked his readers to go to SlaveryFootprint.org and take the survey and post their result in the comment section.

When we think of slavery today, most of us think of sex trafficking. But few of us realize that millions of people around the world are stuck in slavery conditions, they are forced labor. Slavery Footprint defines forced labor as, “Anyone who is forced to work without pay, being economically exploited, and is unable to walk away.” They have created a short survey that will give you the number of slaves that work for you based on your lifestyle. Take it: you might be surprised with the results. And you can share your results in his comment section.

What has this to do with taxes? Nothing directly. It can be argued that some slavery workers are doing jobs done by US factory workers a few years ago and that cost income taxes. Or, if they are abusing their workers there is a good chance they could be cheating on excise and income taxes on merchandise sold in the US. But the bottom line is there are men, women and children who are being abused to cut costs on things we buy and to pad company profits.

Even if you don’t plan to change your lifestyle, take the Slavery Footprint survey. Make it your “I learned something new today!”

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Comments

[Amber in Albuquerque]

Thanks for that. I posted your post and my answer (79) on my FB page. Most of my friends know me as a kind of a "hippie type". Worried about the earth, recycling, living on less, making from scratch, etc. Answering these questions was a real eye opener for me. Gadgets are my big "fall down" (I [the family] have a lot of them, but I try not to replace them often). Thanks for posting this.