Tokyo
Yesterday I went looking for the retail
store that sells products made in Fuchu prison*. I had visited the
retail store about 15 years ago. The retail store that was inside
Tokyo is closed and is now outside the front of the prison, in the
suburbs of Tokyo. (Photo of Fuchu prison front gate.)
Which reminds me that we don't have
prisoners doing work for the marketplace in the U.S. because of
unions. (Prisoners do work on products for use by the States and do
maintenance and cooking for the prisons.)
Unions are the main opponents of free trade agreements, more relaxed immigration laws. Unions kept blacks out of the labor market longer than any other institution and they vigorously fight meritocracy in the workplace. Unions are the main vestigial remnant of feudalism in modern society, since we have eliminated “fair” pricing, bans on banking, inherited social classes, peasants bound to the land, debtors prison and indentured labor.
* See Annette S. Leung's blog on her visit to Fuchu prison (photo by Annette.)