Planet Money Assignment PDF

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PLANET MONEY ASSIGNMENT BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT In 2010, the Planet Money team at NPR decided to start a KIckstarter campaign to raise money to research a story based on the making of a T-shirt. The show creators believed that following this story would be a great lens through which to view the world economy. The Planet Money team eventually created a series of podcasts documenting their T-shirt saga starting from the cotton fields of Mississippi to a processing plant in Indonesia and then continuing further to Bangladesh, where the men’s shirt was made. The final stop in the series was Medellin, Colombia, where the woman’s version of the shirt was manufactured. Jockey was the corporation overseeing the T-shirt production. The interactive documentary was developed from their original reporting. http://apps.npr.org/tshirt/#/title Start with the link above, which begins with a short clip by Alex Blumberg, the host of Planet Money. After his intro, there are five Chapters at the bottom of the screen. At the beginning of each Chapter is a short film clip [1-6 minutes each]. This is followed by written copy that highlights additional facts relevant to that episode. Some Chapters also have short imbedded stories that students should read to round out the focus on globalization. ASSIGNMENT Submit a word document that answers the following questions: 150 words max per response. 1) What disruptive technology is largely responsible for reducing the cost of products to consumers around the globe? Did this surprise you? Why or why not? As we have seen, the number of machines used exceed the number of people involved. All machines have reduced the average cost of labor especially the shipping container. It could hold about 82000 t-shirts in a week whereas before this innovation it would take way more time and weeks to reload and unload the individual boxes they shipped. With cranes and standardized containers, the number of people needed to load and unload ships highly reduced. A global distribution system emerged around standardized boxes that could be easily moved from ships to trains to trucks greatly reducing shipping costs. Super cheap transport was a key reason that apparel companies went from making clothes in one place to managing global supply chains. It was really surprising to see that huge expensive machinery involved had a low marginal unit cost per t-shirt as the production of t-shirts was high which would spread over the overall cost reducing it for consumers as well.

2) In the Planet Money video, we learned that one-half of the T-shirts were produced in Bangladesh and one-half in Columbia. The labor costs in Bangladesh were much lower [$3/day] than those in Columbia [$13/day]. Nonetheless, the final cost to import the shirts was about the same. What could explain this?

With a long tradition of apparel manufacturing and better technology, the Colombians can make T-shirts much, much faster than the Bangladeshis can. In Bangladesh, on one sewing line for our T-shirt, 32 people can make about 80 shirts per hour. One sewing line in Colombia has eight people and can make about 140 T-shirts per hour. The cotton for the men's shirt was spun into yarn in Indonesia, then shipped to Bangladesh to be knit, cut and sewn. Crystal, the Colombian company that made the women's shirts, does everything — from spinning the cotton into yarn to knitting the yarn into cloth to stitching sleeves on a shirt. That makes the process much faster and easier for Jockey, the company that coordinated the production of our T-shirt. Moreover, the regional taxes and import tariffs and quotas vary in each place and that could affect the final price. 3) Overall, what were your reactions to the impact of globalization as seen through the lives of Jasmine and Doris? Women like Jasmine and Doris are working long hours in difficult conditions, dreaming of better lives for their families. I feel like as result of globalization in the garments industry in Bangladesh has made their lives way better because as is it said in the video it would have caused a way worse situation in Bangladesh if the industry collapsed rather than the factory that did. But, if the people want a better life they should expand into other industries as well. However, Colombia is a much more advanced economy and people are in a better position. Their food is guaranteed. In the apparel industry, people in Colombia like Doris makes four times of what jasmine in Bangladesh makes. She can imagine a life outside this industry and has different dreams unlike people in Bangladesh. In Colombia the garment is just a normal industry but in Bangladesh it is a social upheaval. 4) The Planet Money video does a great job of highlighting the complexity of supply chain management - even for the simple production of a t-shirt. If you were in the business of manufacturing t-shirts [e.g., Jockey] how would you better prepare for a disruptive event such as the recent pandemic? I would better prepare in advance for such unforeseen circumstances with my team. I would create a supply chain locally in case of such scenario where everything is produced and manufactured locally. And by creating an online presence where even if customers cannot come to the store live but can buy the products online. Moreover, increase marketing of my business to increase brand recognition and brand value because during COVID only the brands that had a goodwill could sell their products due to high recognition. When a small hint of the pandemic jumps in, I would make the workers work for more hours and more efficiently increasing production and overstocking temporarily to better prepare before anything that makes production stop completely....