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Shame on us Americans for supporting slave labor in China
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CycloWizard
Lifer
First, journalists often have an agenda. I would always favor the statements of a friend who actually lived through a situation than those of a journalist who just did a story on it. By your logic, I should trust the US news reports regarding the war in Serbia in the late 90's rather than my friend who just moved here from Serbia. Who do you think will give more accurate information - CNN or the guy who lived through it?
I offered my own experience to demonstrate why what you view as 'slave labor' is likely not so bad for the people actually living it. By your standards, I was a slave - put to work at the age of 12 for almost nothing! Do you know what SLAVE labor is? Someone who is forced to work for an owner without receiving any wage in return. These people are getting paid, even if it seems like nothing to you. If you want the wages raised artificially (above that which the labor market demands), then you'll just be pushing the jobs elsewhere. This is already occurring in India, where jobs outsourced from the US are now being outsourced to China.
gsaldivar
Diamond Member
Forced labor camps are clearly slave labor... Nobody here is arguing that point.
But the article in your original post refers to workers being paid so many cents per hour, etc. There are no references to imprisonment. Hence - not slave labor.
Your latest source refers to prison camps. There are no references to wages. Hence - slave labor.
I highly doubt that these articles refer to the same factories...
Yeah sure your were a slave laborer :roll:. These people are forced to work, and yes they are paid ENOUGH TO FEED THEMSELVES once a day and nothing more. Comparable to the blacks during the slavery. And yes, I think journalists and reporters are credible in bringing this issue on the world stage. But again, some people choose to ignore this, just like when journalists brought up concentration camps in Nazi Germany and people ignored those.
This is China, remember that. Anyone who dissents is beaten and and his or hers followeres are arrested and/or killed. It is nothing but a brutal dictatorship that has cheap slave labor.
Please dont compare these jobs in these concentration camps to the call centers.
CycloWizard
Lifer
By your logic, I was a slave laborer - not by mine. I worked long hours in harsh conditions for very little money at a very young age. It's not even a difficult analogy to see.
This issue has been on the world stage for at least 5-10 years. Reporters can bring it to attention, but that's not what you were arguing - you were telling me how my friends, who lived through it, knew less about it than do your reporters.
And please, stop pretending that you're the only one here at all knowledgeable about sweat shops.
MidasKnight
Diamond Member
:thumbsup::thumbsup:
Journalists and activists are not evil people who are out to get Bush or America! Remember that. Sure, fine.
A friend of yours saw a nice little factory and everything was humpy dumpty fine and dandy there. What does that mean?
There are hundreds of thousands of slave labor camps across China besides that one. Thats why I would rather take the word of a reporter and/or activist.
CycloWizard
Lifer
Journalists and activists have never worked in a sweat shop. I can give you the cell number of my Indian classmate who has if you'd like. That means he knows a far sight more about the situation there than you do, or even your beloved reporters. The point is that your perception of 'slavery' is colored by what you live on a day-to-day basis - the pampered American lifestyle. These people choose to work in these shops because it's the best thing available. If you artificially 'fix' all of their problems, the shops will close up and they'll be worse off than they are now.
Ha, this is what is fueling China's economic boom. Close these down and there is no Chinese economic expansion! Fixing their problems doesn't mean a thing, this is China, your get forgetting that. This is a evil, brutal dictatorship and with every single item you and I buy, they get stronger.
You say activists never worked in these slave labor camps? There in fact many Chinese activists out there, who worked in these camps trying to get the worlds attention to this matter.
America already turned China into the worlds factory, and we are only making them stronger. In fact, we are slowly digging our own graves.
Tell me how were the journalists who tried to ALERT the IGNORANT American masses of human rights violations of Jews and mass slave labor concentration camps during WW2 were colored in any way. There are not just reporters who cite the slave labor, but Chinese activists themselves. Americans ignored the holocaust until it was too late, this is another type of holocaust which is taking place in China. But we must face up to it and not ignore it.
Also, India is not comparable to China. Are there sweatshops with terrible conditions in India? You bet, but no where close to the magnitude of that in China. And the Indian govt. is not a tyranny which has slave laborers.
CycloWizard
Lifer
Sounds like you're a lot more interested in American supremacy than the actual Chinese workers. Have you ever been to China? Ever talked to anyone from China? Obviously not, or you would be a lot more informed on how 'brutal' their dictatorship is.
The journalists you speak of in WW II were the ONLY source. Who would you listen to more - the journalist who saw Auschwitz or an escaped prisoner?
You pretend to know the difference between India and China, but you do not.
Let me respond to your blatant false assertion about India and China. India has been a free and open democracy since 1947. China has been a communist dictatorship with absolute control since the Japanese left. Heard of Tiananmen square? Heard of the falun gong? Im surprised why you would side with the Chinese dictators.
I am talking about BEFORE the rescue of Nazi concentration camps by Allied forces by Americans. The journalists tried to inform the American and other people of this, but both the public and the politicians ignored it. But the politicians knew of the concentration camps all along, yet did nothing until the end of the war when we liberated them
It is the job ofjournalists to educate the people of human rights abuses, no matter where they are happening. It took journalists to to tell the rest of the world of the genocide in Rwanda, but again noone listened. Jounalists are telling us of these concentration camps in China and again, the masses ignore and deny it.
I am sad to say that man will never learn from history 🙁
Yes, I am interested in American supremecy. But America has been going on the wrong path, and the election of Bush hasn't changed that.
This strikes me as one of those catch-22 situations. By purchasing the products we are supporting the terrible conditions they are forced to accept. By not purchasing the products we doom them to the deadly poverty they faced before. Damned if you do, damned if you don't....
Text
Gas explosion in coal mine kills at least 203 in China
February 15, 2005
Shanghai, China -- A gas explosion in a coal mine in China's northeast killed at least 203 miners, the government said today, in the deadliest such disaster reported since communist rule began in 1949.
The explosion Monday afternoon at the Sunjiawan mine in Liaoning province also injured 22 miners and trapped 13 underground, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.
The cause of the blast, which occurred 794 feet underground, was under investigation, it said.
----------
The chance of a Chinese coal miner dying is 3,000 greater than an American coal miner. That is just unbelievable. It goes to show you that the Chinese government regards its people as nothing but expendible pawns in their attempt to become the worlds superpower.
But again, America and mainly its greedy corporations are supporting all this slave labor in China. I agree that we have no choice but to buy some Chinese-made goods, but think about the people who made them. Think how many hours they put into their work-day and under what horribly conditions they worked in.
Text
Poor working conditions plague Guangdong
China's capitalist miracle was made possible by cheap labor. But now the workers have started standing up for their rights
P , Dongguan, China
Saturday, Feb 05, 2005,Page 9
Labor disputes in southern China's booming Guangdong Province are becoming increasingly prominent as an unprecedented army of 30 million migrant workers clamors for better conditions and treatment.
This astonishing influx of cheap labor has been the engine of China's capitalist miracle, officials say, making Guangdong the nation's most prosperous region.
It has also turned the Pearl River Delta into an export-oriented manufacturing hub, from Hong Kong in the east to Foshan in the west.
But as the government tries to maintain the image of an investor's paradise based on low production costs, the workers, increasingly backed by state media, labor rights groups and even the courts, are clamoring for an end to slave-like working conditions.
"There are several causes of worker disputes, but the leading reason is when enterprises don't pay salaries," said Wang Guanyu, director of the Guangdong Labor and Employment Service and Administrative Center. "The workers are very aware of their need to protect themselves so if there are violations, they will complain directly about it."
Another cause is the sweatshop conditions at many factories, including low pay, seven-day work weeks, 15-hour working days, mandatory overtime, a poor working environment and often coercive factory regulations.
Recent riots at the Taiwanese-invested Stella International shoe factory in Dongguan and a spate of other smaller workers' strikes and walkouts in the region reflect the growing sense of labor strife.
"There is not a factory in Dongguan that abides by the Labor Law. I would say 50 to 60 percent of the factories here make you work seven days a week," said a worker surnamed Wu who toils at the city's Henghui packaging factory.
The Labor Law mandates a 40-hour, five-day work week and a range of worker benefits.
Rush of Migrants
Wang said the government's hands were too full trying to administer the migrant rush into Guangdong -- with numbers jumping from 5 million registered workers in 1995 to 10 million in 2001 and nearly 20 million last year -- to concentrate solely on labor issues.
Only registered workers who have had jobs for at least six months are included in the figures, with another 10 million unregistered workers also estimated to have met the six-month working criteria.
A further 10 million could be looking for work, Wang said.
This gives Guangdong by far the largest share of China's officially estimated 140 million migrant workers. Another around 6 million are in Shanghai and 5 million in Beijing.
Most of the workers in Guangdong are under 35, more than half are women and they largely come from impoverished inland provinces like Hunan, Hubei, Jiangxi, Anhui, Guangxi and Guizhou.
Many are engaged in light industrial manufacturing, including electronics, as well as cheap Chinese textiles like plastics, shoes, clothes, toys and furniture that are mainstays in markets worldwide.
`Market Forces'
The government's priority is creating more jobs by attracting investment and building more factories, and the implementation of legally mandated labor rights and benefits should be brought about with "market forces," Wang said.
"Generally speaking, we want to raise the quality and effectiveness of our labor force and this will mean higher wages and better benefits, but this is a process that will take time," Wang said.
"Right now we are hoping to allow the market to work for itself. If factories want a stable work force and don't want to see their trained workers leaving for other factories, then they are going to have to pay them better and give them better benefits."
Besides, it is nearly impossible to monitor work conditions at the tens of thousands of factories that have mushroomed in the region over the past 20 years, he said, admitting that labor laws and regulations were hard to enforce.
Reports last month by China's only legal trade union, the government-run All China Federation of Trade Unions, and the Communist Party-administered Jiusan research group showed migrants made up 35 percent of Guangdong's work force and were responsible for 25 percent of its GDP last year.
However, in the past 12 years their salaries have only risen 68 yuan (US$8) on average, said the reports, cited by the Yangcheng Evening News.
Salaries
Three-quarters of migrant workers in Guangdong made less than 1,000 yuan a month, with most of the rest earning less. Average monthly costs totalled 500 yuan.
By comparison, the average monthly salary for a non-migrant worker in Guangdong was 1,675 yuan.
Despite regulations that call on factories to give all workers retirement insurance, only half of migrant workers had any, the reports said.
Such conditions have resulted in large numbers of migrant workers frequently changing jobs.
Wang insisted that while conditions were difficult, "there are a lot of benefits too."
"Migrant workers in Guangdong made some 30 billion yuan last year, that is about an average of 8,000 yuan a year per worker. Much of that money goes back to their poor rural hometowns," he said.
This story has been viewed 831 times.
-------------
This is only in Guangdong provice, in China's remote provinces, conditions are much worse.
Gas explosion in coal mine kills at least 203 in China
February 15, 2005
Shanghai, China -- A gas explosion in a coal mine in China's northeast killed at least 203 miners, the government said today, in the deadliest such disaster reported since communist rule began in 1949.
The explosion Monday afternoon at the Sunjiawan mine in Liaoning province also injured 22 miners and trapped 13 underground, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.
The cause of the blast, which occurred 794 feet underground, was under investigation, it said.
----------
The chance of a Chinese coal miner dying is 3,000 greater than an American coal miner. That is just unbelievable. It goes to show you that the Chinese government regards its people as nothing but expendible pawns in their attempt to become the worlds superpower.
But again, America and mainly its greedy corporations are supporting all this slave labor in China. I agree that we have no choice but to buy some Chinese-made goods, but think about the people who made them. Think how many hours they put into their work-day and under what horribly conditions they worked in.
Text
Poor working conditions plague Guangdong
China's capitalist miracle was made possible by cheap labor. But now the workers have started standing up for their rights
P , Dongguan, China
Saturday, Feb 05, 2005,Page 9
Labor disputes in southern China's booming Guangdong Province are becoming increasingly prominent as an unprecedented army of 30 million migrant workers clamors for better conditions and treatment.
This astonishing influx of cheap labor has been the engine of China's capitalist miracle, officials say, making Guangdong the nation's most prosperous region.
It has also turned the Pearl River Delta into an export-oriented manufacturing hub, from Hong Kong in the east to Foshan in the west.
But as the government tries to maintain the image of an investor's paradise based on low production costs, the workers, increasingly backed by state media, labor rights groups and even the courts, are clamoring for an end to slave-like working conditions.
"There are several causes of worker disputes, but the leading reason is when enterprises don't pay salaries," said Wang Guanyu, director of the Guangdong Labor and Employment Service and Administrative Center. "The workers are very aware of their need to protect themselves so if there are violations, they will complain directly about it."
Another cause is the sweatshop conditions at many factories, including low pay, seven-day work weeks, 15-hour working days, mandatory overtime, a poor working environment and often coercive factory regulations.
Recent riots at the Taiwanese-invested Stella International shoe factory in Dongguan and a spate of other smaller workers' strikes and walkouts in the region reflect the growing sense of labor strife.
"There is not a factory in Dongguan that abides by the Labor Law. I would say 50 to 60 percent of the factories here make you work seven days a week," said a worker surnamed Wu who toils at the city's Henghui packaging factory.
The Labor Law mandates a 40-hour, five-day work week and a range of worker benefits.
Rush of Migrants
Wang said the government's hands were too full trying to administer the migrant rush into Guangdong -- with numbers jumping from 5 million registered workers in 1995 to 10 million in 2001 and nearly 20 million last year -- to concentrate solely on labor issues.
Only registered workers who have had jobs for at least six months are included in the figures, with another 10 million unregistered workers also estimated to have met the six-month working criteria.
A further 10 million could be looking for work, Wang said.
This gives Guangdong by far the largest share of China's officially estimated 140 million migrant workers. Another around 6 million are in Shanghai and 5 million in Beijing.
Most of the workers in Guangdong are under 35, more than half are women and they largely come from impoverished inland provinces like Hunan, Hubei, Jiangxi, Anhui, Guangxi and Guizhou.
Many are engaged in light industrial manufacturing, including electronics, as well as cheap Chinese textiles like plastics, shoes, clothes, toys and furniture that are mainstays in markets worldwide.
`Market Forces'
The government's priority is creating more jobs by attracting investment and building more factories, and the implementation of legally mandated labor rights and benefits should be brought about with "market forces," Wang said.
"Generally speaking, we want to raise the quality and effectiveness of our labor force and this will mean higher wages and better benefits, but this is a process that will take time," Wang said.
"Right now we are hoping to allow the market to work for itself. If factories want a stable work force and don't want to see their trained workers leaving for other factories, then they are going to have to pay them better and give them better benefits."
Besides, it is nearly impossible to monitor work conditions at the tens of thousands of factories that have mushroomed in the region over the past 20 years, he said, admitting that labor laws and regulations were hard to enforce.
Reports last month by China's only legal trade union, the government-run All China Federation of Trade Unions, and the Communist Party-administered Jiusan research group showed migrants made up 35 percent of Guangdong's work force and were responsible for 25 percent of its GDP last year.
However, in the past 12 years their salaries have only risen 68 yuan (US$8) on average, said the reports, cited by the Yangcheng Evening News.
Salaries
Three-quarters of migrant workers in Guangdong made less than 1,000 yuan a month, with most of the rest earning less. Average monthly costs totalled 500 yuan.
By comparison, the average monthly salary for a non-migrant worker in Guangdong was 1,675 yuan.
Despite regulations that call on factories to give all workers retirement insurance, only half of migrant workers had any, the reports said.
Such conditions have resulted in large numbers of migrant workers frequently changing jobs.
Wang insisted that while conditions were difficult, "there are a lot of benefits too."
"Migrant workers in Guangdong made some 30 billion yuan last year, that is about an average of 8,000 yuan a year per worker. Much of that money goes back to their poor rural hometowns," he said.
This story has been viewed 831 times.
-------------
This is only in Guangdong provice, in China's remote provinces, conditions are much worse.
You can't expect a transitioning economy to suddenly promote a $6.75 minimum wage. Overworked and underpaid labor has plagued every modern economy at some point in history. The 19th century industrial revolution in the United States involved immense amounts of cheap labor provided by women and young children, with long working hours and by your standards, "slave" wages. If you really feel these wages are unfair, donate t o third party charities that help impoverished people in those countries. As the Chinese people enjoy a stronger economy, industry will change alongside with it. It's simply a matter of time.
This thread has been very interesting. My family business, which I am not a part of, is manufacturing men's dress shirts and we own a few factories in South China among other locations. In fact, my older brother just started managing in one of those factories. I'll ask him how the workers are treated (I'm sure he will be honest with me) but from what I hear so far it seems they are treated rather fairly. I think right now he's working on the worker's compensation plans and he plays bball with the workers in the mornings.
This thread has been very interesting. My family business, which I am not a part of, is manufacturing men's dress shirts and we own a few factories in South China among other locations. In fact, my older brother just started managing in one of those factories. I'll ask him how the workers are treated (I'm sure he will be honest with me) but from what I hear so far it seems they are treated rather fairly. I think right now he's working on the worker's compensation plans and he plays bball with the workers in the mornings.
imported_Condor
Diamond Member
The empire that Clinton built!!
imported_Condor
Diamond Member
Not supporting this is difficult. Everything on the store shelves that can be shipped is from China these days. Buying in the expensive stores is not a determinant in whether you support the China slave factories. Look at the labels and you will discover that almost all consumer goods are made in China. I now buy Coosa Jeans because they are made in America. They are the only ones I could find that are!
Remember that Clinton was hosting Chinese dignitaries in the Lincoln bedroom and that Washington had many Chinese financiers who left when his impeachment proceedings started!
I had no problem with imported goods until they all started coming from China. My issue is not only how they produce goods so cheaply, but that this productivity is making them the strongest nation on the face of the earth. Not bad if they don?t make it so, but they surely could.
Remember that Clinton was hosting Chinese dignitaries in the Lincoln bedroom and that Washington had many Chinese financiers who left when his impeachment proceedings started!
I had no problem with imported goods until they all started coming from China. My issue is not only how they produce goods so cheaply, but that this productivity is making them the strongest nation on the face of the earth. Not bad if they don?t make it so, but they surely could.
daniel1113
Diamond Member
I cannot believe I even have to respond to this thread, but I do.
You are absolutely correct, CycloWizard. The working conditions in these countries are terrible, no doubt about it. However, for the vast majority of the workers, these jobs are a step up from the next best option that they would have to otherwise resort to. Boycotting the companies that employee these people is about the worst thing that could possibly be done to improve their situation (unless you think living on the street, most likely as a prostitute if they are women, is an improvment).
I am also an engineering student, and there are 5-6 students in my classes from India and China, and they all say the same thing.
People also seem to forget that EVERY country goes through a "sweatshop" stage at one time or another. Hell, just look at England during the industrial revolution, or go read "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclaire that discusses the meat packing plants in Chicago during the early 1900's. The more China, India, and numerous other countries continue to get involved with the high tech and world markets, the sooner working conditions will improve.
... or we can all just stand around blaming Wal-Mart. Sigh.
0marTheZealot
Golden Member
64 cents an hour vs 20 dollars an hour. Who do you think you would hire if you were the CEO of any company?
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