I have just watched a story on A Current Affair, about items made in China purchasable from K-Mart in Australia - at low prices.

The story showed about five seconds of the 2013 Bangladesh factory collapse, where over 1000 people died - despite selling clothing to Australian stores.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/companies/kmart-sticks-with-safe-bangladesh-factories/story-fni0d54w-1226673382452?nk=eb4d83daeed5244243da306db8f1f15f

The wages of Chinese workers and living conditions was given 'glossy' coverage. Their factory we got to see at least was realistic.

The site we saw looked a lot better than Bangladesh despite: "Kmart does not own any factories and we are unable to arrange visits or guarantee access." K-Mart website. Of course we were all told about the wonderful creative jobs in Australia. K-Mart's junk to eventually go to landfill was ignored.

How can we get people out this K-Mart mindset?

How to get out of this mindset?
BuY BRANDNAMES*[SURE THeir still made\iin the same china factorieS]
BUT YOU WIll feel less guilt because YOUR OVER pAID SPORTS HEROES wearing them too[plus..nstead of buying 3 opr 4/you just buy the one

ha ha
as if you can stop/at one
i got fewer shoes than amalda marcOS[but got ten times her shoes in tshirts and clothing/recall the dats when the ritch hAD 7 SHIRTS ONE FRESH FOR EACH DAY"

and we didnt,..by from kmart
we went to the double the price store
that yet wa able to sell meNS SIZE HANKER-CHIEFS
cause haVING PEACE OF MIND/RESISTs the allure/BUT BARGAINS GALORE?TOO

look they TOO/have to live/EAT/BUT LIKE BIG BUSNESS/everywhere
as/they polute they produce/its factored into the cost benifit analisis.

the marketeers rule
mechantilisM/was a bOON TO MANKIND
and woman and kids were earlier adopters
[so much so govts GAVE KIDS THEIR OWN 'SPENd'*monEY

LETS FACE IT/IF YOU CANT READ nor write
your the first generation to be close eNOUGH
TO A afford-SCHO0L TO MAKE life 'potentIALLY BETTER for the kids/parents suFFER FOR LOVE/a parent/needs health expenditure/so you sold your soul to the compANY STORE

oR RETUNED HOME THE LONG LOST SHEEP
but its funny/these people/ALL THEY KNOW IS TO SEW
AND OFTEN EVEN AFTER DEATH;keep working slaving away/MAKING JUNK
Chapter XXX The Fifth Division. The Blatant Materialists. Churches in Hell 153
http://www.ghostcircle.com/ebooks/JSM_Ward%20-%20Gone_West.pdf

ITS FUNNY;PLUS ITS EXPLAINED
we dont want something;and look for excuses not to buy
but its so cheap i wll buy a SPARE[i got junk comming out of my butt/CAUSE IT WAS ONE THIRD THE PRICE OF THE LAST ONE I BOUght.

THINK I PHONES[no im over it]

Nathan,

To get out of this mindset you need to be prepared to pay much more for similar products made in Aus. Experience has shown that 90% or so of Australians buy on price.

Experience has shown that 90% or so of Australians buy on price.
Shadow Minister,
Therein lies the problem, a patriotism governed by our exchange rate.
Selling land to foreigners, It doesn't get any better than that does it !
Aren't you just so proud to be Australian ?

So you still watch A Current Affair! Have you no access to a Library or vegetable patch.?
Regards, Unwiley Will

You've got to get away from this self hatred guilt trip Nathan.

This is how progress happens in every nation, just be thankful you live in a country where it happened before you were born.

England went through it first, with their industrial revolution. Do you wish it hadn't happen, & you were still a surf? It worked it's way through the western world. Going through it first is what made the western word rule.

After the war it went through Japan, then Taiwan, & is now working it's way through the rest of Asia. The Chinese peasants are not flocking to the cities because what they have back in the subsistence village is better you know. If you want to feel sorry for someone, feel sorry for Pacific islanders including New Guinea, who might have to wait a few generations yet.

For god sake, stick a patch on that bleeding heart of yours, & live a happy life.

In response to prefernottodoso,

I don't watch a lot of television - so I was going through to see what was on. I just happened to see on Friday at the end of the (ACA) program, that an element on K-Mart would be on & it looked questionable.

I wasn't 100% sure on the content, so I waited for the story and it looked like a K-Mart commercial - and how everything is wonderful.

It was showing how everything 'made in China' is fine when:

"Since the 1990's there has been an increasing number of apartments built in China which remain empty. By 2010 approximately 65 million apartments, capable of housing some 250 million people, were unoccupied, due to these being too expensive for the majority of Chinese to purchase or rent with millions of urban Chinese living in slums".

Most of what you see and hear on "A Current Affair" is nothing more than a form of advertising disguised as currant affairs.
Just don;t watch it.
You may as well watch an infomercial.

It's called globalisation. Manufacturing is shifted to debased slave countries to undercut wages, working conditions and social and environmental conditions in decent countries with the effect that inexorably the decent countries lose their conditions until they are no longer decent. Our pollies set us on this path (without consulting us) decades ago. Abbott is accelerating the downward spiral. What can an individual do? I don't think singling out K-Mart helps. However where possible all purchasing should favour the Made in Australia brand and all free trade pacts with slave countries (e.g.Asia) should be politically resisted.

Kmart are big advertisers on Channel 9. So anything presented about Kmart as "current affairs" will naturally be biased. One problem Kmart has is a bad press about what they pay people in theses sweatshops.
Wesfarmers (Kmart) are pathetic payers to the majority of their Australian staff, but there are exceptions;

The chief executive of conglomerate Wesfarmers, Richard Goyder, saw his total salary increase by more than $1 million to $8.01 million last financial year, but the payout is still dwarfed by the remuneration paid to Coles boss Ian McLeod whose pay was $14.8 million in 20011-12.

Can someone post the pay rate for the turkey running Kmart. I think it equals about 10 million Chinese pay packets. Beside lots of stuff in Kmart comes from that mega rich country Bangladesh, who are even cheaper than China.

To properly understand our spending habits, the main driver behind cheap imported goods, we need to go back say forty odd years.

Back then, mid 70's, we saw some major changes here in Oz.

Colour TV was launched, then came the likes of video rentals, albeit, a few years later, then eventually, the mobile phone.

All these items had one thing in common, they all competed for a share of the disposable dollar. Combine this with the 'keep up with the Jone's mentality' that had also crept in to many of our lives, and all of a sudden, we were left with less disposable income.

Then along came the 'buy now, pay latter' schemes, you know, interest free and no repayments for four years, another sector claiming it's stake.

We then saw the introduction of discount air fairs.

Now while these were great, they also meant that one could pack up and go away for the weekend at a moments notice. Of cause the air fair was only the start, because then came accommodation, meals etc etc. More disposable income gone.

So, because now days most of us have at least one mobile, an Internet connection and a plasma or two, combined with increased costs of living and our much more frequent short stay holidays, something had to give.

One such something, was clothing.

So, unless we see real wages increase dramiticly (which they can't) consumers will continue to seek out savings where ever they can because human nature often dictates that it's better to save where possible rather than do without.

Funny part is, while most people won't pay for decent clothing, they are happy to shell out $45 per liter for a latte. It's a weird world at times.

So Nathan, if you are waiting to see a return to how things were forty, fifty odd years ago, when the chair you sat on didn't match the one your siblings had,Nor did you care, my tip is, don't hold your breath because those days are gone.

backwards/butcher;..<<..Funny part is, while most people won't pay for decent clothing, they are happy to shell out $45 per liter for a latte. It's a weird world at times.>>

how about 20 dollars for potatoes;kilo?
LIKE CRISPS?

OR 2000 a litre for printer ink?

MATE THE 70.S I REMEMBER IT WELL 99 CENT LPS
AND 99 DOLLAR F8 PROIECTORS[AT THE TIME A TRAINEEE MANAGER TAKING HOME 39 DOLLARS

[WHEN ONLY 10 YEARS AGO TRADE,mAN TOOk HOME..9 POUNDS..A FEW BOb SIX AND THREE PENCE..*[OF COURSE WITH A THRI*PENCE YA COULD SPLuRGE
HECK EVEN A PENNYS WORTH

OF FIRE CRACKERS PLEASE
and a penny bunger*

<..>>So Nathan, if you are waiting to see a return to how things were forty, fifty odd years ago, when the chair you sat on didn't match the one your siblings had,Nor did you care, my tip is, don't hold your breath because those days are gone.>>

INVESTMENT DEPENDS ON QUALITY..AND RAREITY
COMBINED WITH DESIRABILITY..AND OPPERTUINITY*

It's a funny thing talking in dollars OUG, because take your LPS for a dollar and your mid managers wage of $39. 39 LP's for a weeks work.

Today a lattest release CD costs about $30 and a mid managers wage is about $1225 a week take home, or about 40 CD's. No change there that I can see.

Health care for most is now cheaper, shoes another, air travel, milk, bread, eggs and clothing.

I still say this is because people's average disposable spend has decreased and some things had to give.

Spare a thought for the producers of these items because while we demand cheaper goods, they are the ones generally taking the hit.

Well my financial plan is,

To never pay full price for anything.

Although, sometimes you just have to. Try anyway.
Find a cheaper alternative with the same ingredients or
appeal, or else keep watching the liked item until it
is reduced to a price you think is more reasonable.

Like the fellow in the movie "the Castle"
I look at a price on something, and think, "don't be ridiculous
you're dreaming."

Also, if they give you a deal of two for the price of one, which
brings the grocery item down to half price, buy ten of them.

I know it won't save Australian jobs but that is caused by
Globalisation and I don't know how to fix that. That
is caused by overpopulation and resulting poverty.(which reaults
in a large cheap labour force.)

It was set in motion when Australian families decided not to
have lots of children, anymore. And Women aren't going
down the road of having 4-10children any time soon, it just places
too much of a tremendous mental and financial handicap
on them.
In the words of Germaine Greer, in a book I picked up
in a second hand shop recently, "The Western World hates children and have made having children almost immoral in our culture."
So we head down the road of genetic extinction of the once
great Western Empire.

So,I will be enjoying myself on the money I save buying cheap stuff
while the extinction slowly takes place.

Well CHERFUL, sadly, you're right as in my opinion we have gone too far down the track now to turn back and it will all fall in a heap some day, just when is anyone's guess. Perhaps another world war will be needed before wesee some balance. Hope not, but what other choicesdo we have.

We have sat ackand watched the dreas of buying Aussie made, with massiveadvertising capaigns by te likes of Dick Smit continually fail as despite the fact that many ofus drea wit our hearts, we shop with our wallets and 99% of the time, price wins.

There was a time when no farmer would buy anything other than a Honda small engine, whereas now, you can buy three of four imports for the price of one, and they do, myself included. In fact, so long as you change the oil regularly, they seem to go on and on.

The other issue we face is that both sides of politics is hel bent on allowing competition into the market place. Of cause, this same competition has now all but ruined most small retailers, which is a pity because most small retailers also raise their children in the same area, which leeds to donations to school fates etc, another area that suffers from lack of funding.

So the K Mart mentality is here to stay and now that the governments are allowing the likes of Cosco into our market place, it's a case of the dog being eaten by a bigger dog.