During the 1980s, New York City's garment district employed around 30,000 workers.
The authors calculate some 120,000 garment workers employed in the 62 factories that produce items for Walmart do not have fully viable fire exit systems.
As Chinese-made clothing has flooded the domestic market, the number of garment workers employed in South Africa has plummeted to 60,000 from 150,000 in 1996.
So believes Jo Wood, founder of Jo Wood Organics, who recently made a trip to Bangladesh with the ethical clothing brand, People Tree, to witness the acute difference between the lifestyles of garment workers employed by fair trade producer groups and those subject to exploitative free-market conditions.
In the early 1980s, Chinatown's garment shops employed 20,000 workers.
The resulting garments will employ the simplified shapes Ms. Sarafpour favors, but ornamented in a way, she said, that resembles "paintings on a blank canvas, something abstract," part Mark Rothko, part Damien Hirst.
According to the BGMEA, which has become one of the country's major sources of political power, the garment industry employs 3.5 million workers, and the number of garment factories has nearly doubled since 1999.
The collapse of Rana Plaza, which housed five garment factories employing more than 3,000 workers, is now considered the deadliest accident in the history of the garment industry, with the death toll so far at 446 and many others still missing.
The Bangladeshi garment industry employs four million people, mostly women.
The garment industry employs over 200,000 people, and accounts for 80% of the country's exports.
