This consensus is mainly in reply to the elimination of child labour. Child labour is crucial to some countries's economies. There is a great fear that labour standards that better the conditions and lives of workers, will cost these developing countries their small vital place within the global market making their suffering only worse. I do believe that if capital continues to be allowed to flow from one country to the next, then labour standards will have served no purpose. I believe that unless there is a standard, a global standard, not an international minimum wage, necessarily but a consensus on products, and cost, and how much will be given to the workers. I think that if everyone had to sell a product for at least a certain amount, then there would not be a detrimental flow. The WTO and others believe that restrictions will not ensure equality so everyone may compete only on the basis of their natural talents, but rather that labour standards will create an inefficient system that will result in the ruin of eventually all markets within the global economy. It is important for the WTO and others to resist labour standards because they will lead to a global crisis, with lower quality products, less productivity, and less creativity amongst individuals.

The WTO addressed to the conference on "Globalization as a Challenge for German Business":

Trade does seem to benefit the overall GDP of a country, thus allowing more money to be used for social programs. This philosophy suggests that if a developing country's people suffers for one generation, and they engage in free trade, then their children will have enough resources to have a higher standard of living. I suppose then there must be another reason, why some of these least developed countries have not improved as much over time. Of course the WTO has only be in existence for a couple of years, GATT did not have as much influence as the WTO has, so we will have to wait and see what occurs with these countries.

Meanwhile studies fail to substantiate claims that weak labour standards in poor countries depress wages in rich countries. It is also argued that child labour in poor countries imposes emotional costs on rich-country consumers who find this offensive, and is thus another cross-border side-effect. If so, the rich would do better to send the children aid rather than impose harmful trade sanctions. If exports made by child labour are banned, children often end up unemployed or in unregulated sectors such as prostitution Nor, needless to say, does slapping trade sanctions on poor countries that employ child labour sit well with the WTO's aim of promoting free trade.

The IMF provides us with this information: The most recent World Economic Outlook studies 42 countries (representing almost 90 percent of world population) for which data are available for the entire 20th century. It reaches the conclusion that output per capita has risen appreciably but that the distribution of income among countries has become more unequal than at the beginning of the century. But incomes do not tell the whole story; broader measures of welfare that take account of social conditions show that poorer countries have made considerable progress. For instance, some low-income countries, e.g. Sri Lanka, have quite impressive social indicators. The (inflation-adjusted) income levels of today’s poor countries are still well below those of the leading countries in 1870. And the gap in incomes has increased. But judged by their HDIs, today’s poor countries are well ahead of where the leading countries were in 1870. This is largely because medical advances and improved living standards have brought strong increases in life expectancy.

The IMF also states that growth in living standards springs from the accumulation of physical capital (investment) and human capital (labor), and through advances in technology (what economists call total factor productivity). I interpret this to mean that if developed countries were provided with enough capital, and technology then less labour would be needed, so children could go to school, and after the GDP has risen, wages for workers should also increase. The IMF states that "what matters is the whole package of policies, financial and technical assistance, and debt relief if necessary.

The IMF has run into some severe criticism:

The leading financier, George Soros said the IMF does not understand the financial markets well enough to regulate them.

But even some of the IMF's sternest critics accept that without it, Asia's crisis would have been much worse.