It wasn’t that long ago that we were all being told to abjure cheap clothing - fast fashion. We were, apparently, just consuming, as if that were a bad thing. So, the story went, we should buy fewer clothes, made more locally, at higher cost, because this would be, in some manner, better.

Then we saw that fast fashion industry disappear for a bit:

Surviving on a bag of rice: plight of Bangladeshi garment makers

Clothing factory workers in Bangladesh were hit twice by Covid-19, once when their factories closed, and again when global retailers cancelled orders

The absence of it is worse. As it was always obvious it would be for it its existence didn’t make things better then why and how did it come into existence? Or, perhaps, why did we voluntarily call it into existence by spending our money upon it?

Nazmin Nahar, a 26-year-old garment worker and mother of two in Dhaka, Bangladesh, is living on borrowed rice. She hasn’t had the wages to pay for food or rent for more than two months.

Even though the hours were long and the targets relentless, Nahar had been happy working at Magpie Knitwear, where she earned £150 a month, making clothes for UK brands such as Burton and H&M.

In that time and place that £150 a month is not far off what a private sector school teacher would get for educating to A level standard. And is more than a state sector teacher gets although they also gain accommodation.

The reason wages are generally at that low level is because Bangladesh is still a poor place even as it is getting richer by leaps and bounds. Poor places simply do have low wages as Paul Krugman has explained.

So, fast fashion. It makes Nazmin and another 4 million like her in Bangladeshi factories better off. It makes us better off as we get to consume more clothing. Can we therefore agree that it’s a good idea? You know, making the world a better place by making us humans richer?