Condoms – Buy American

I read an interesting piece today on condom makers. Apparently, like many products today, they can be made cheaper in China.

USAID, United States Agency for International Development, a federally funded program that distributes 10 billion condoms to poor countries, in an attempt to help curb the spread of AIDS. They will no longer be distributing American-made condoms.

“Of course, we considered how many U.S. jobs would be affected by this move,” said a USAID official who spoke on the condition that he would not be named. But he said the reasons for the change included lower prices (2 cents versus more than 5 cents for U.S.-made condoms) and the fact that Congress dropped “buy American language” in a recent appropriations bill.

Okay, so they are cheaper, which means that they can give out more, but when you look at the track record of recent Chinese products, do you still think that this is a good idea?

First, there’s the loss of 300 American jobs. A company in Alabama called Alatech was the previous USAID program supplier. In case you haven’t noticed, American families are struggling. We certainly don’t need to cut jobs, we need to increase jobs. Banks and auto makers aren’t the only folks going broke.

Second, there’s the Chinese baby formula scare, the Chinese toy scare, the Chinese __________ (fill in the blank) scare. When it comes to health, welfare, and birth control, do we really think cheaper is the best way to go?

I didn’t give it much thought before, but from now on, when I buy condoms, I’m going to make sure that I’m buying American.

Image credit: All Posters.com