Counterfeit Industry: The High Cost of Counterfeiting

Counterfeiting is a major industry, with a network of about 600 billion dollars worth of fake stuff getting churned out every year. What’s more, it grows about 30% annually. Two thirds of all counterfeit goods come from China, and in 2008 there were over 4 million possibly counterfeit listings on eBay alone! Squeezing real goods out of the marketplace and adjusting (lowering) what people are willing to pay for them is another detrimental effect of counterfeit goods. They also cost the people making the genuine articles jobs. It’s estimated that US workers lost 750,000 jobs in one year due to counterfeiting. 100,000 of those jobs were in LA county alone, and 25,000 in Detroit. The false goods from one facility can fill up 16 miles of train cars.

Counterfeit Industry: The High Cost of Counterfeiting