Earlier this month, stomach-turning images of brutally abused Hong Kong maid Erwiana Sulistyaningsih shamed the world's "freest" economy, and rightly so.
When the Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal designate Hong Kong the world's premier business mecca each year in their Index of Economic Freedom, they're highlighting the free entry of foreign capital, a first-world legal system and low taxes. But Erwiana, a native of Indonesia, highlights the ugly underbelly of Hong Kong Inc., and of globalization itself.
Footage of the beaten, burned and tortured 23-year-old being carried, nearly lifeless, to safety quickly went viral. Few took seriously Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying's pledge to protect the rights of the more than 300,000 foreign domestic helpers in his city.