They are nothing alike.
Poverty, to a large extent, is a deliberate construct because a weak labor force is an exploitable one. Sure, you don't whip people any more. (Well, somewhat. Ask the UAE[2]) You just make sure their life is going to be rather short if they don't work for you, at your conditions.
[1] https://www.supplychaindive.com/news/female-garment-workers-... [2] https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/oct/23/m...
They differ they same way rape and regular sex does: By consent.
Sure, to an outsider watching it can look very similar. But it's not.
Our grandparents were probably just as poor as the third world laborers are today. They were allowed to work their way up and build prosperous countries. The third world is well on their way doing the same.
1: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/178676.Disposable_People
Yes, human rights have to be seriously improved in many countries and many companies offering jobs in developing markets really need to clean up their worker rights standards, but on a fundamental level, we can't simply compare a given economic change to our ideal of how things should be (because ideals are not limited by any practical constraints). We have to compare it to existing and previous alternatives.
To me it's like that rabbit duck optical illusion[1]: when seen one way it seems reasonable, even almost inevitable, and then it suddenly flips and sounds like smarmy weasel words excusing exploitation.
Here's my suggestion, why not pay the former rice paddy worker 50$/day and improve human rights at the McShoe Vietnam factory? It's still an awesome bargain by western standards.
Oh and the money is there, just cut the seven figure salaries of all the C level executives back at McShoe headquarters.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit%E2%80%93duck_illusion
To put the money into perspective, $50/day, which might seem like a pittance to most people on HN, is almost 4-5 times the amount that most employees make at some of the better Indian outsourcing companies.