Dayton Business Daily

Should US companies that do business in the global market and foreign companies that trade in the US?

be bound by US laws in their dealings in and out of the USA? What comes to the top of my mind is Blackwater USA and the lack of laws regarding its troubles in Iraq, child labor use to manufacture goods in India, and the endless unsafe products coming from China into the USA. Lacking a global authority to enact and enforce laws, shouldn't the USA require all its trading partners to comply with US laws, including labor and safety laws, as well as requiring US companies to comply with US laws in their business practices in foreign countries? The Blackwater incident I was refering to was the Blackwater employee who murdered an Iraqi security guard and faced no charges.

Public Comments

1. Yes, the US should. However, if the US implements too severe a policy, it's likely to harm American businesses who move operations overseas in order to exploit the cheap labor pool. That in turn effects the stockholders, who in turn give less money to the politicians. So, while it's a noble idea in theory, in practice it probably will never fly as long as we have crooks steering the ship.
2. its too easy to jump to a rash decision on this but the fact is sometimes circumstances are not warranted to do just that. EX. blackwater is in charge of transportation of high ranking officials. if they are attacked they need to have the ability to shoot back. Now correct me if Im wrong but the point of an ambush is to STOP the convoy. So if a blackwater employee shoots back are they now obligated to stop the convoy to check the wounded, kind of defeats the purpose of their job doesnt it. Rash laws and decisions in the governement always create more problems then they are supposed to fix. With regards to trade their are sanctions against companies that are caught not complying with practices in some cases but not others. Im sure their are reasons for some of them, maybe not all.