On Utilizing A Foreign Workforce

Jean Jaurès, French Socialist leader (1859-1914)

Call me crazy, but I actually enjoy reading and learning about economics and finance (among a plethora of other things, as I'm sure you've noticed).

Anyway, I fell upon this little quote (that I've translated from French for you), which I thought made for excellent food for thought. I think it's particularly interesting to note that this was said during a speech at the end of the 20th century...

What we do not want is for international capital to find its workforce in markets where it is the most degraded, humiliated, disparaged, to then throw it onto the French market, and to bring salaries around the world down to the level of those in countries where they are at their lowest. It is in that sense, and only in that sense, that we wish to protect the French workforce against the foreign labor, not, I repeat, out of a chauvinistic exclusivity, but to substitute international well-being to international misery.

~Jean Jaurès, speech "For a socialistic customs system" (Fr: "Pour un socialisme douanier"), February 17, 1894.

So, what are your thoughts on the subject?