Exploitation: A problematic pejorative

When people use the word "exploitation" in the context of sweatshops, I think they want the word to express a negative judgment. I think that most of the people using the word in this way haven't thought things through clearly.

The greedy capitalist makes the poor person an offer: "Work for me, and I'll pay you $2 an hour." The poor person accepts the offer, glad that he'll still be able to feed his family next week. Meanwhile, an activist is leading a boycott of companies who use sweatshop work. He thinks it's disgusting that anyone should work in such terrible conditions for such a low wage.

If the activist is successful, the capitalist and the poor person won't be able to make the exchange that they both wanted, and the poor person will be back to where he was, with one less option and not knowing where next week's food was going to come from. The activist, to the extent that he's successful in closing down sweatshops, is hurting the interests of the poor person by denying them the option of working in a sweatshop.

The greedy capitalist, by following self-interest, is actually increasing the options of the poor person and improving his situation. If the complaint against the capitalist is that he should be doing more to help, uh, that's surely no reason to prevent him from helping the poor person a little bit. Surely, a little help is better than none at all.

Also, if the complaint against the capitalist is that he should be doing more to help the poor person, then surely that complaint must apply even more strongly to the activist. Whatever their intentions, the activist leading the boycott is actively making the situation of the poor person worse to the extent that his campaign is successful.

So please think twice before you use the term "exploitation" to describe sweatshop work. What do you mean by exploitation? Why do you believe it's negative? If the outcome of what you call exploitation is an improvement over how the situation would otherwise have worked out, does it still make sense to use this term in a negative way?

If exploiters are helping the poor, even just a little bit, while the opponents of exploitation are harming the poor, does it still make sense to use the term "exploitation" as a pejorative? I don't think it does.