Nike is an overhyped shoe company whose commercials show Michael Jordan rising five hundred feet off the ground, driving the ball into the rim, then making us believe we could fly if we had. their shoes. Nike gets its money by pricing its so-called high-end sneakers at $125 and up. (Yamada, Masako.np.) Millions of children in the United States buy these shoes because they are endorsed by some of the greatest athletes on the planet, such as Griffey Jr., Johnson and Hardaway. Nike uses our jealousy, our desire and our dreams to get money from children. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an Original Essay Shoes are welcoming and comfortable to wear, but we need to think about who makes these shoes. Nike leaves the United States to find cheap labor to produce these shoes. Most of the places they go to are mainly poverty-stricken third world countries, like Indonesia, Vietnam or the Philippines. Most of us may think this is acceptable, until we know how much their employees are paid and how they are sexually and physically abused. Nike factories in Vietnam treat women like slaves, paying them as little as $1.60 a day; most of them only make twenty cents an hour. (Yamada, Masako. np.) Congress should pass a law that any American company doing business in other countries must pay its employees at least seventy-five percent of the American minimum wage. Of course, this would reduce Nike's profits, but it would bring more prosperity to families in these third world countries. This would improve the economies of these countries and allow employees to be paid better. Many would begin to wonder why a company, with profits of $237 million, would pay a worker $1.60 per day. (Nike protest: boycott Nike. np.) This is simply greed. Nike can certainly afford to pay workers the money they deserve. Most of us know that this company produces a shoe that costs about $10 to make, but raises the price to $120, making an outrageous profit. Nike only cares about how much money they make and how much they can save using forced labor, paying each employee less than $2 a day. Sure, they say, they're sorry, but they never seem to take any action to prevent this from happening in the future, especially in third world countries that don't have laws prohibiting corporal punishment employees. A few years ago in Vietnam, fifty-six women did not wear proper shoes to work and were forced to run laps around the factory until twelve of them fainted. Most would think that a company that owns the most marketed shoe in the world would be a little more thoughtful. If they can afford to pay million dollar contracts to people like Jordan or Woods, they should be able to pay those people whatever salary they want. (Yamada, Masako .np.) Nike says it is launching campaigns to check working conditions in its factories and try to correct problems. What they are doing is not enough. They should conduct surprise inspections four to five times a month and interview every fourth or fifth employee to find out whether they think working conditions are satisfactory. Another solution would be to have a resident supervisor from the States.