sweatshops

Could sweatshops be morally permissible if the laborers were not children?  In some socioeconomic areas working in a sweatshop is financially good.  Often people would get paid even less for other jobs such as cleaning.  For some, sweatshops are the only way that families make enough money to survive.  Sweatshops also do a good job of stimulating the economy in an area that needs all of the help they can get.  as long as working conditions for laborers in sweatshops and safe and fair, it should be allowed.  As soon as work conditions are unsafe and children are used as workers, it is no longer morally permissible.  When sweatshops are closed it puts the families of the workers there in financial turmoil.  By closing down sweatshops we could be doing more harm than good.  For many laborers in sweatshops, the money they get paid is the only money coming in for their families.  It is how they are able to put food on the table.  If we shut down sweatshops, we are shutting down their only source of income.  Also, no one is being forced to work under these conditions.  Even if this may be the only way they can make money, they could always choose not to work in a sweatshop.