Consumers ‘partly to blame’ for Pac Brands cuts.
Pacific Brands recently cut 1850 jobs from their work force.  They make clothes, and they make them here in Melbourne.
Those jobs are gone. The people are unemployed (hopefully they’ll find new jobs). The company lives on and will greatly benefit from shedding the staff. For them they hope that their bottom line will be protected.
The CEO talks about the tough decision. She had sleepless nights and anxiety over the decision, but at the end of the day, she had to do her job and so she did. She’s lucky, she has a job.
Sue Morphet, the CEO, blames us, the consumers. We stopped buying our underpants from them. We stopped buying locally made products. We stopped because we can buy them cheaper elsewhere. (Although this llama likes to swing in the breeze).
While there’s much gnashing of teeth and alpaca spitting going on, she’s right. Why would I buy some shorts from Bonds if I can get some cheaper ones from a company that has outsourced to China. I, and I’m sure you do too, love a bargain. I work hard for my grazing money.
People complain that its all about profit. Dur. Pacific Brands is a company, they have shareholders and they expect a return on their investment. I wonder if shareholders buy imported jocks.
While there is this inequality in the world, where we get paid per hour what someone earns in a month, this sort of thing will continue to go on. It’s cheaper to get underpants made in China, then put on a boat, sailed across the sea, unpacked and distributed than it is to make them here, stick them in a truck and deliver them. And we can’t have it both ways.
We’re guilty as charged. Our individual greed means we buy cheaper, so there’s little point in complaining about the loss of jobs when we contribute to that loss. The only way to stop this is to start paying the Chinese worker a decent wage, or take a pay cut and reduce our cost of living. It means that we will probably have to pay more but in the long run everyone would be better off. It’s not rocket science.