I have 66 slaves working for me. Or at least that’s what Slavery Footprint estimates based on my lifestyle and the size of my family.
For a quick snapshot, you answer 11 pages of questions, including your age, the number of children you have, whether you rent or own a home, what’s in your medicine cabinet, what you eat, the clothing you own, how much jewelry you own and what electronics you have. If you have time, you can fine tune your results by reporting specific number of items. Like how many computers, leather shoes or stuffed animals you have.
For me, the main contributors were my electronics—not a big surprise there, as slavery has a large footprint in mining of raw materials—and my children’s stuffed animals. Now I have a better idea of my impact on human trafficking, and I learned some interesting facts about forced labor while filling out the survey. For instance, did you know that “bonded labor is used in Southeast Asia’s shrimping industry, which supplies more shrimp to the U.S. than any other country?”
The website, which was created by Call + Response, a non-profit dedicated to ending slavery, in collaboration with the State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, estimates the number of slaves by taking a look at more than 450 products—from the sourcing of their raw materials through the manufacturing of the finished product. And the data is taken from sources such as the Department of Labor’s “List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor 2010,” International Labor Organization’s “Committee of Experts Reports 2011-2003” and Transparency International‘s “Corruption Index 2010.” Check the site’s Methodology page for a complete explanation and list of sources.
From Kelly on November 01, 2011 :: 9:15 pm
I had difficulty fine tuning my results-it wouldn’t save my changes. I doubt the average person has only 25. We’ve removed ourselves from a large portion of the consumerism in America, yet we still scored 51. We do have electronics and know that’s a big contributor, but we don’t buy any cosmetics or toiletries, and raise a good portion of our own food.
I fine tuned the electronics to accurately reflect what we do own (less than avg, I’d say) and our score went up-even though every time I go back to it, it has reset to the defaults.
Overall, good info to have, but what to do about it?
Reply