With my fibromyalgia, my regular days are several hours to get through the stiffness to get going, taking care of my fibro by swimming and stretching, cooking lunch and dinner together so I only need to cook once and simply microwave dinner plates in the evening, take the kids to activities on the bus, and hit the couch immediately upon coming home. When I go to the bathroom, I move a load of laundry, but most often rely on Tom and the kids to put it away. I rely on Tom and the kids to clean outside of the kitchen and cooking related tasks. That is my life most days. It is fine for me, but leaves little energy for other things including writing these posts.
Of course, in Guatemala, the cleaning comes with the place and it costs very little to pay the person to cook a meal (lunch and dinner together :o) like at home). This frees up my energy for more posts and more educational site-seeing. While it is still slow travel, doing only one or two activities a day most days, I can manage them much better.
However, when discussing this recently a relative sort of sneered, particularly when I mentioned that I knew several people who were able to be home with their kids with house help when they were small and they could stretch their various small but remote incomes (some online work, some child support, some investment income) in cheaper countries like Guatemala. The person who sneered, along with many other Americans, shops at Walmart (they are all pretty bad, but Walmart is the worst given its level of profits) and many other large stores who take advantage of even cheaper overseas labor than house help in Guatemala. No one in the United States can escape it. Even L.L.Bean makes items overseas (although at least they take responsibility for their products more than other stores). Most Americans are taking advantage of cheap labor, mostly because there isn't a choice. Globalization cannot be fought on the individual level. I have researched trying to and it can be done on small fronts, but not large. The people with the power, who control the government, need to address it.
Regardless, the hypocrisy is infuriating. When you hire house help, you can make a point to pay the higher end of the wage range for the area and position. You can be generally aware of the prices they need to pay for items for themselves. You can make sure they eat some of the meals they make for you. You can be flexible about their work hours to take care of family commitments. You can recommend them for further positions if they like. You get the idea. When you shop in the U.S. for items, most of which are made overseas, you have no idea how the people are treated and because you don't see them you don't even have to think about them or about globalization.
Hopefully, my kids will think about it and understand it as they progress through their lives. They are experiencing differences in prices and wealth first hand in Guatemala. They look our part-time housekeeper in the face and and have to face it in a more real way. I am not sure most adults have such a perspective on globalization and our economic system. Schools certainly don't teach it well. This is mainly because they don't teach economics well. Noam Chomsky frequently says "Adam Smith who you are supposed to worship, but not read". Schools have spun the economic message far away from the classical texts. I can't help but think this is on purpose. While I love teachers and they are very knowledgeable, few have a grasp of macroeconomics. It doesn't appear to be taught in teaching colleges. When it is covered it is covered in a separate course rather than holistically interwoven throughout history. History is kept separate focusing on names, places, and dates. Even in a college macroeconomic course, more emphasis is on mathematical models than broad conceptual differences which, sometimes, can't be quantified easily.
Only time will tell if the concepts are sinking in with the kids, but I would like to think that living it for a month will give them a perspective.
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