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In 1991, 56.2 percent of all clothes purchased in the United States were American-made. By 2012, it was down to 2.5 percent. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, between 1990 and 2012, the US textile and garment industry lost 1.2 million jobs.

H&M was Bangladesh's largest apparel exporter, even if the brand was in the clear, it might still be hammered by labor rights groups and consumers as a symbol of all that was wrong with offshoring:

The garment industry generates an enormous cash flow for the Bangladeshi government, and not only on a revenue level. In 2018, 10 percent of Bangladeshi parliament members owned garment factories and 30 percent had family members who were owners,

Siddiqur Rahman, president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, told me. "Fifty million people depend on the garment industry. Our economy is dependent on it." The government planned to double output in five years.

Roundup is the world's most heavily used pesticide, and it accounts for 40 percent of the global glyphosate weed killer market.

Trade agreements and globalization changed that landscape. By 2018, there were roughly six thousand textile and garment production companies in Vietnam, employing 2.5 million workers, and accounting for about 16 percent of the country's exports and more than $30 billion in revenue. Experts believe that last figure will jump to $50 billion by 2020.

the late 1980s, a new segment of the apparel business cropped up: "fast fashion," the production of trendy, inexpensive garments in vast amounts at lightning speed in subcontracted factories, to be hawked in thousands of chain stores. To keep the prices low, fast-fashion brands slashed manufacturing costs--and the cheapest labor was available in the world's poorest countries.

But seest thou not what a deformed thief this fashion is? William Shakespeare,

Conventional cotton is also extremely thirsty: to grow one kilo requires, on average, 2,600 gallons (or 10,000 liters) of water. Processing it swallows even more: approximately 5,000 gallons for one T-shirt and a pair of jeans. If fashion production maintains its current pace, the demand for water will surpass the world's supply by 40 percent by 2030.

Nonorganic cotton--known in the business as "conventional" cotton--is among agriculture's dirtiest crops. One-fifth of insecticides--and more than 10 percent of all pesticides--are devoted to the protection of conventional cotton, though it is grown on only 2.5 percent of the world's arable land. The World Health Organization has classed eight out of ten of America's most popular cotton pesticides as "hazardous."

Conventionally grown cotton is one of agriculture's most polluting crops. Almost one kilogram (2.2 pounds) of hazardous pesticides is required to grow one hectare--or two and a half acres--of the fluff.

They are hyper-polluting--in their creation, and in their afterlife.