Why Lead in Toy Paint?
It’s Cheaper By David Barboza New York Times SHANGHAI, Sept. 7 – When Mattel, the world’s largest toy maker, announced its third recall in six weeks this month, the company asked consumers to return toys because they contained dangerously high levels of lead paint. Toxic paint also turned up in several other products Mattel recalled in recent weeks, and in about 16 other recalls this year, including the popular Thomas & Friends train sets, according to the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission. All the products were made in China. Why is lead paint – or lead, for that matter – turning up in so many recalls involving Chinese-made goods? The simplest answer, experts and toy companies in China say, is price. Paint with higher levels of lead often sells for a third of the cost of paint with low levels. So Chinese factory owners, trying to eke out profits in an intensely competitive and poorly regulated market, sometimes cut corners and use the cheaper leaded paint. On the books,
