forced labor and generative ai combine to squeeze a clueless american workforce

By Dr. Jim Castagnera, Esq., Member, Portum Group International, LLC

As my colleague, Ken Sprang, has eloquently pointed out in the last three postings to this Blog, child labor remains a curse in 21st century America.  Abroad, conditions fostered or tolerated by some American-based multinational corporations are even worse.

A case on point: “Walmart and Centric Brands are investigating their supply chains in Cambodia over allegations that inmates at the country's largest women's prison were illegally employed to produce garments for export, following questions posed by Reuters and inquiries from a U.S. industry group about labour practices there.” [https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/walmart-centric-probe-suppliers-potential-links-cambodia-womens-prison-2023-08-21/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=Newsletter&utm_campaign=Daily-Briefing&utm_term=082123]

For my part, recent blogs in this space have been about the onslaught of Generative Artificial Intelligence that began with the release of ChatGPT by OpenAI, Inc. in November.  I have argued, and continue to believe, that this is the most revolutionary and disruptive technological advance so far this century.  It marks the first time that once-untouchable professions are now threatened with obsolescence.  Just ask the writers and actors, who have been on strike in Hollywood all summer.  They see the writing on the wall (no pun intended).

So… if you are on the bottom of the workforce totem pole, you face unfair competition from forced labor, be that comprised of kids or convicts.  And if you imagine yourself at the top of that totem, well then you are in the uncomfortable position of having AI prodding your once cushy seat.

One result is the relentless gutting of the American middle class, once the staunch backbone of American democracy.  

Listen: I’m no socialist.  I’m not too sure I even qualify as a liberal.  Among my American heroes are three great Republican presidents… Abe Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan.  My granddad’s first presidential vote was for Teddy; I myself voted twice for Ron.  

That said, I can never quite get my mind around the notion that an entrepreneur --- let’s say a Jeff Bezos, currently worth something like $140 billion [https://www.investopedia.com/investing/how-jeff-bezos-got-be-worlds-richest-man/] --- should control that kind of wealth, while Amazon employees who want a union face firing. [https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/02/tech/amazon-jennifer-bates-fired/index.html]

The justifications we are fed for allowing this kind of wealth disparity within a corporation include “this is how a free market works.”  Hey, nobody is more convinced than I that capitalism creates wealth like no other known political/economic system.  But let’s stop treating the so-called “free market” as if it was an immutable law of physics.  It’s not.

Another justification is that the entrepreneur --- let’s stick with Bezos --- built the business and is entitled to every penny he can squeeze out of it.  So what is he… Superman… leaping tall buildings in a single bound?  No, if he, and Gates, and Bloomberg and all the rest of the billionaires’ club have leapt tall buildings, it’s because they stood on some very broad shoulders.  For instance:

• Despite our politicized Supreme Court having granted them full citizenship in recent cases, American corporations are simply the creatures of state law.  Corporations only exist because state governments enable them to incorporate.

• Once a corporation is in business, it can only continue to confidently conduct commerce because the state and federal courts enforce their contracts.  

• Speaking of commerce, what do those ubiquitous Amazon delivery trucks drive on?  Well, bless my soul!  It seems they all use the public roads and streets financed by tax-payer dollars and maintained by state and municipal authorities.

And yet, in 2020  a total of 55 profitable companies in the Fortune 500 paid no federal income taxes. [https://www.americanprogress.org/article/these-19-fortune-100-companies-paid-next-to-nothing-or-nothing-at-all-in-taxes-in-2021/]

It’s easy to ignore such data when you’re sitting pretty yourself.  It’s even easier to ignore forced labor.  But ChatGTP was a game changer.  As the Hollywood writers and performers are attesting daily on their picket lines, we professionals are threatened for the first time with the sort of redundancy which many “ordinary” folks have faced for decades.

Will that lead to more unionization in America?  I recently have argued that it should. [https://hr.cch.com/ELD/LaborPulse_81823.pdf]  But I’m not holding my breath.  As P.T. Barnum once so eloquently observed, “No one ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American people.”

Just look at what’s become of the Grand Old Party of Abe, Teddy and Ron.  Half its adherents still cling to the ridiculous notion that Donald Trump won the 2020 election.  The man is fending off four criminal indictments and remains the front runner for the Republican presidential nomination.  

I think I can say with certainty, he couldn’t possibly care less about the fate of his devoted followers, just so long as they keep sending in those checks and voting for him in those primaries.  But no matter… like Hitler 100 years ago, he’s the symbol of their anger.  They are smart enough to know they’ve been left behind in 21st century America.  They just aren’t smart enough to see that the solution lies elsewhere.