It is a term which has fallen out of favor and usually used in a derogatory sense, and this is something which stops the prevents the different sides of politics discussing issues rationally.

With respect to the first definition, it is simply a neutral statement of use. Resources are there to be used, just as a computer is there to send email, or a cup is there for drinking out of.

With respect to the second definition: There is no such thing as exploitation between informed, consenting, rational, non-monopolistic parties.

Most people who protest about 'exploitation' of the poor and disadvantaged are unable to define exploitation. They will typically give examples of exchanges between different parties of different affluence. A worker in a poor country is paid forty cents per hour to make sports shoes which sell in a rich country for a hundred dollars, while a successful sports-person is paid millions to promote those shoes, and people scream about exploitation.

The common elements where this description is used tend to be that

• Some parties in the system have a much higher standard of living than others.
• There is perception that in a transaction, that some parties get enormously more benefit out of it than others.

Basic economics suggests that if one party in the supply chain is making huge profits (buying shoes cheaply and selling them for many times that with little overheads), then other business people would move into that market and do the same thing. They would compete for the business, undercut each other (buy for more, sell for less), and the margins would disappear.

This argument breaks down in the following situations:

• In the case where people do not have a choice of who to deal with.
  • For example if the government of the poor country doesn't let their people move around to find alternatives. It is usually communist governments which do this.
  • If someone has a monopoly on a market and other people cannot reasonably move into that market. This rarely happens in a free market economy, though some would argue that Microsoft is an exception to the rule.
• If the people do not make an informed decision. This is the case where children are forced to work in factories.
• When others are prevented from competing with them. Such as may happen with corrupt governments.

In fact even with corrupt governments, the employees still benefit from the trade. Anyone who doesn't believe this may like to ask the employees themselves whether they would like their factory to close down so they can go back to what they were doing before. Very few of them would choose this.

See

• Trickle-down