Walkley Award-winning reporter Sarah Ferguson recently investigated the tragic fire at a clothing factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on the ABC's Four Corners.
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She managed to trace clothes ordered by big Australian brands back to factories in Dhaka that did not adhere to international safety standards.
The documentary posed that classic question - what is a fair price?
A $10 T-shirt might be a bargain to us, but is it worth the life of someone at the end of that supply chain who is earning less than $10 a week and who works in a locked room in a factory operating well outside any standard of a safe working environment?
Discount retail stores are offering increasing bargains, and most of us have been quick to jump on, happy to pay less than $15 for a toaster. We all do it. I bought a $35 microwave recently and then suffered a major bout of buyers' remorse as I pondered the possibility of how such a product could have been manufactured for such a price. But it didn't occur to me until I'd got the product home and was comparing it with my old one, which had managed to last me 12 years.
Big supermarket chains have been getting into trouble for false advertising with regard to the source of their goods, but local suppliers are still getting squeezed as home-brand items dominate our shelves.
Some consumers make the ''buy local'' choice at supermarkets in order to support local suppliers, but isn't it time to consider ''paying a fair price'' to support workers everywhere?
Why are we prepared to pay good money for some things but not for others? Luxury goods are something we don't mind paying more for, but what about financial advice? The old system of paying for advice was a trailing commission. This was a percentage fee of your investment amount, often paid in perpetuity, as financial planners said that clients were unwilling, or unable, to pay what they thought were expensive one-off fees upfront. But calculated over the life of the investment, commissions usually ended up being much more than that upfront fee.
The Future of Financial Advice reforms (FoFA), which came into effect on Monday, ban trailing commissions on investment and superannuation products (although products sold before then will still carry commissions, as do life-insurance products). A ''best-interests duty'' has also been introduced. It explicitly states : ''advisers will be required to act in the best interests of their retail clients and place their clients' interests ahead of their own when developing and providing personal advice''.
The reforms are designed to look after clients and prevent situations like the ''boiler room'' picture painted at a major bank recently. They are long overdue. The end result is also a fair upfront price being paid for non-conflicted advice.
In a nutshell, the cost of goods or services is not limited to just the price you see. In the case of clothing, the cost can be the poor working conditions and the welfare of the workers. With supermarket goods, it's the impact on suppliers, and with commissions on financial advice it's the quality of that advice.
So when it comes to our next purchase decision, let's try and think a little less about the number on the tag and a little more about the process along the supply chain. After all, what price would you put on a life?
