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Comment by timje1 | Hacker News Reader

Around half of all eggs laid in the UK come from free range hens (1) - I believe this increasing proportion is partly due to a sticker requirement to mark eggs with 'Eggs from caged hens'.

I wonder what effect there would be on the electronics industry if all iPhones in the EU had to be sold with a prominent sticker 'Produced with slave labour' ? I honestly think that regulations can nudge the behaviour and expectations of 'the masses' through this kind of labelling.

(1) http://www.rspca.org.uk/adviceandwelfare/farm/layinghens/far...

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The problem is that "free range" is easy to define.

Which criteria should we label for that are meaningful in other countries across the world?

Made by workers:

Receiving Minimum wage (which one)?

Receiving Free healthcare?

Working a maximum of 8 hours / day?

Over the age of 16? 18?

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for it, but defining what is acceptable is not easy. Don't forget that in most western countries no access to free healthcare would be defined as unacceptable. Also in some poor countries 14 year old "kids" have fought against anti-child labour laws because they were the only provider for their family and there is no help from the government regardless of your condition.

There's ISO 26000 [1] which is voluntary and SA 8000 [2] which is a certification. That would be a start.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_26000

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SA8000

"Free range" isn't the label used in the example you replied to, but "from caged hens".

The problem isn't trying to define meaningful labels, but to record the most salient facts. For starters: record and disseminate the human hours exerted and wage paid for each manufactured item.

2 Assemblers @ 1 hr/each @ $2/hr

1 Packager @ 1 minute @ $1/hr

etc

Consumers may then dynamically choose based on their current preferences. I don't think it's an ideal system, but it would be a significant improvement over the current situation.

"Free range" actually isn't so easily defined, and most "free range" eggs, come from hens living in conditions that most reasonable people would still consider absolutely appalling.

Yea, now I aim for pasture raised which is essentially the gold standard here in the USA and implies the hens lived primarily outdoors and ate what they wanted.

Lots of time "free range" is the same as caged, just... without the cages. The hens are too fat to go anywhere anyways.

That makes sense to me. If we accept that the market isn't perfect, and that all participants do not have perfect information (or even as a corollary market participants will not always recall or connect known information to the transaction they are considering), then increasing awareness of market information allows the market to perform better. In this case, people want free range eggs for whatever reason (there could be many, but I'm sure we can all think of the obvious ones), and making them aware of that helps them make that decision.

'Produced with slave labour'

Love it.

Daylighting externalities is key to changing behavior. Enough of us vote with our dollars to move the needle.

I stopped eating chocolate (cold turkey) when I first learned about the plantations using slave labor, children, etc.

I resumed buying chocolate when I learned about the Fair Trade program.

http://fairtradeusa.org/products-partners/cocoa

I can just imagine how much having to mark phones "made by slaves" in a non removable way would impact sales.

Imagine a state passing a law requiring stickers like that, but not outright banning items known to be produced by slave labour. The message would basically be that yes, we are fully aware that some products are made with slave labour and we are OK with that (as long as it's clearly marked).

Apple removed an app that hinted at that:

http://www.geek.com/apple/apple-approves-then-removes-app-hi...

I agree! I the US we have focused more on branding the positive aspects (local, organic) and socially stigmatizing the negative (e.g. labeling smoking). But as I mention above, that ends up making a class distinction more than real change.

The Prop 65 problem[1].

It's impossible to prove that the entire supply chain for any electronic device is 100% free of exploitative labour conditions. Metals are fundamentally untraceable and a modern device contains components from hundreds or even thousands of suppliers, sub-contractors and second sources. All it takes is one manager twenty steps down in the supply chain to lose a piece of paper and your chain of custody is broken for a sizeable batch of devices.

In practice, every electronic device would be required to carry such a warning label simply as a precaution, rendering it meaningless.

[1] http://oehha.ca.gov/prop65/background/p65plain.html

The point the article seems to be making, though, is that pretty much everything is made with slave labor. Phones, computers, tabletops, tombstones, shrimp, fish, steel, sugar - everything. So you'd be slapping the "Produced with slave labor" label on everything, which probably wouldn't change behavior.

"This product is known in the state of California to..."

What smartphones do you imagine aren't produced with slave labor? Is there even a phone on the market with no Foxconn parts?

For this to work, there has to be an ethical alternative available (if at slightly higher cost).

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