We are all Slave now.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

There is a difference. "Worth" isn't the issue. That difference is the bedrock of economics: supply and demand. In the low level economies, the labor supply of fungible "work units" is plentiful. If you don't show up for work, there are a slew of your peers who would work for a wage sufficient to buy food for that day. And the supply chain for the finished products can be falsified to show that each pair of pants was sewn and assembled by happy workers who sing during their tea and yoga breaks, instead of by child workers who are abused.

The determination of demand, however, is based in part on the level of the wage base.

Ultimately, we will head for a unified global labor market. We are already approaching a world in which the disparities within countries based on the urban / rural divide are often more significant than the barriers among countries' core urban areas.

I suspect what we are seeing now is the dying spasms of the old "first world" economies as they transition to a new order. The real question is going to be what that order looks like, and I think Trump's answer is "China".