Hard Choices

Trey Smith

Since June, I've been ruining my friends' online-shopping lives. Back then, I reported on a vast warehouse in Ohio where goods bought from online retailers are sorted, boxed, and shipped to consumers. Unsurprisingly, this job does not pay well. A little more surprisingly, this job seems designed to crush employees' spirits. During my visit, two people got fired within 10 minutes, one for talking to someone while he was working — "Where are you from?" was the offending comment — and one for going to the bathroom too much. So occasionally, and now more that it's the holidays, my friends and family will call to complain that "Bleh, I want to order something from Amazon/Walmart/Staples/whatever, but I feel guilty about helping oppress workers."
~ from Pity the Elf Slaves of Online Shipping by Mac McClelland ~

In this day and age, it can be very difficult to be an ethical consumer. While most people give little thought to the working conditions and wages of the folks who produce and sell the stuff they buy, some of us do try to factor these sorts of variables into our purchases. Still, it can be downright challenging.

I use to purchase a lot of items from Amazon.com -- I still do every now and then. Initially, my strategy was to support a Washington-based business. I am a stronger believer in supporting one's local and regional economy. However, over the last 18 months or so, I've read quite a bit of discomforting news about this online giant. In many ways, they are becoming as bad as Walmart and I refuse to shop at Walmart.

Since I live in an area that has no bookstores and I read a lot, I have two choices when it comes to buying books: 1) Travel a minimum of 45 miles to the nearest bookstore or 2) Buy books online. (And yes, I make frequent use of my local library as well.)

After doing some internet research, I discovered several other online booksellers: Thriftbooks.com, Betterworldbooks.com, Abebooks.com and a few others. Over the last 18 months, most of my book purchases have come from these companies.

It felt good to support what appeared to be more progressive companies. Several advertise that they sell books for local bookstores. So, I reasoned, while my number preference is to support my local economy, I was at least helping to support small independent bookstores throughout the country.

Sadly, I later discovered that all is not what it appears to be. Many of these so-called "local" bookstores are anything but. Several, though not all, are strictly online sellers who maintain giant warehouses -- no storefront -- just like Amazon.com. It seems that they were created solely to give the APPEARANCE of small independent bookstores.

Consequently, I guess it really doesn't matter a whole hell of a lot which online service I utilize. Most all of them appear to use the same template and I bet a lot of the others have the same kinds of poor working conditions and pay that Amazon.com does.

Like I wrote at the outset, it really is hard being an ethical consumer these days!!