NYT Expose On Chinese Working Conditions In Apple Factories - Microeconomic Help Please

[anaconda]

Why are Chinese workers pulling 112 hour weeks, subjecting themselves to harmful chemicals, and committing suicide? When employees of Google in Mountain View, CA have work weeks that are half of that, upscale dining facilities, and a volleyball court for lunch time relaxation?

I guess this article is the big news story recently...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/26/bu...pagewanted=all

[cubical]

Because the Chinese workers have no better alternative. The US workers have a better alternative than those working conditions because we are futher along the capitalism road. Same reason we have no child labor. We can afford it.

[The_Ruffneck]

Because the Chinese workers have no better alternative. The US workers have a better alternative than those working conditions because we are futher along the capitalism road. Same reason we have no child labor. We can afford it.

So just because something was OK 200 years ago it's OK now?
Show your disdain by not giving Apple any cash , if you do want apple products just buy second hand - theres a flood of second hand sales every 6 months when the sheep run off to buy the latest thingamabob.

[kah13176]

So just because something was OK 200 years ago it's OK now?
Show your disdain by not giving Apple any cash , if you do want apple products just buy second hand - theres a flood of second hand sales every 6 months when the sheep run off to buy the latest thingamabob.

This plan only forces the sweatshop laborers out of jobs. Making little money is better than making even less or none at all. The reason they work in sweatshops is that there's not another, more preferable alternative. Again, I stress that people watch this:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dx5fz...layer_embedded

[Cutlerzzz]

So just because something was OK 200 years ago it's OK now?
Show your disdain by not giving Apple any cash , if you do want apple products just buy second hand - theres a flood of second hand sales every 6 months when the sheep run off to buy the latest thingamabob.

If you are really concerned by the conditions in China, you should buy more Chinese products, not less.

[onlyrp]

If you are really concerned by the conditions in China, you should buy more Chinese products, not less.

you mean if we bought less Chinese products, their work conditions would get worse?

[Paul Or Nothing II]

listen guys, i make around 40k USD in india for work i would have routinely got 120k if i had an US passport .barely median american salary,but my country's standards and purchasing power parity, i am very well off.i can even afford foreign vacations.please get a perspective. and yes,we often pull allnigthers here at work.not because we are slaves,but because most of us want to get away from poverty/mediocrity of the socialist past.it is just too damn recent to forget and demand mollycoddling

Yup, most people don't understand the concept of purchasing-power-parity neither do they understand the concept of "money"; they think "money" is important but in reality it's the GOODS & SERVICES that matter, the more there are, the more prosperous people will be & the only way to maximize goods & services is people making allowing those who are producing them to maximize profits & re-invest them to produce even more!

People also don't realize that these sweatshops is what has allowed countries to grow in the first place

If you are really concerned by the conditions in China, you should buy more Chinese products, not less.

So obvious but socialists just don't realize it! And thereby they only perpetuate more misery

[onlyrp]

Yup, most people don't understand the concept of purchasing-power-parity neither do they understand the concept of "money"; they think "money" is important but in reality it's the GOODS & SERVICES that matter, the more there are, the more prosperous people will be & the only way to maximize goods & services is people making allowing those who are producing them to maximize profits & re-invest them to produce even more!

People also don't realize that these sweatshops is what has



So obvious but socialists just don't realize it! And thereby they only perpetuate more misery

the same reason people want "jobs" when in fact they want either money or goods, they'd be happy to be unemployed if they had everything else they wanted.

[onlyrp]

So just because something was OK 200 years ago it's OK now?
Show your disdain by not giving Apple any cash , if you do want apple products just buy second hand - theres a flood of second hand sales every 6 months when the sheep run off to buy the latest thingamabob.

Yes it's OK today beceause it was ok 200 years ago, how else can you say we should follow the advice of our founding fathers and Constitution if you think we should stop doing what people did 200 years ago.

[cubical]

So just because something was OK 200 years ago it's OK now?
Show your disdain by not giving Apple any cash , if you do want apple products just buy second hand - theres a flood of second hand sales every 6 months when the sheep run off to buy the latest thingamabob.

What are you talking about? Unless someone is putting a gun to their head, they don't have to be working for Apple. Ask yourself, "why do they?".

[Inny Binny]

Chinese labour laws are atrocious. You get thrown in prison if you even think about organising a union. Don't justify these awful conditions as being part of a free market.

[kah13176]

Chinese labour laws are atrocious. You get thrown in prison if you even think about organising a union. Don't justify these awful conditions as being part of a free market.

They are a part of a free market. It's true that it's illegal to unionize, but even if Chinese could unionize, it wouldn't solve much. The video below is for anyone who thinks this way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dx5fz...layer_embedded

[Inny Binny]

They are a part of a free market. It's true that it's illegal to unionize, but even if Chinese could unionize, it wouldn't solve much. The video below is for anyone who thinks this way.

Third world countries artificially suppress wages in order to attract capital. It's good for the Chinese government, as they get more revenue and large GDP growth. It's good for western governments and their citizenry, as they get cheap goods. The only losers are the billions of people who are forced to work essentially as slaves.

It is truly ridiculous to try and pass this sort of international trade as part of the free market. In order for that to be the case, both the US and China would have to be free themselves - which is obviously insane.

[Tod]

They are a part of a free market. It's true that it's illegal to unionize, but even if Chinese could unionize, it wouldn't solve much. The video below is for anyone who thinks this way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dx5fz...layer_embedded

Great find! +rep!

[eduardo89]

Chinese labour laws are atrocious. You get thrown in prison if you even think about organising a union. Don't justify these awful conditions as being part of a free market.

A law like that might go a long way in making the US a better place

[Seraphim]

There's a monumental difference between publicly funded government unions and private unions. The latter (the right to it) is fundementally part of a free market. The former is an act of aggression and should not be tolerated.

A law like that might go a long way in making the US a better place

[TheBlackPeterSchiff]

A law like that might go a long way in making the US a better place

Why? Should people not be free to unionize and collectively bargain?

[seraphson]

No worries. Assuming America continues on its current economic course I don't think we'll be feeling bad for anyone but ourselves within the decade. At least the ones who haven't waken up yet.

[LibForestPaul]

They are slaves, without property rights, without liberties, without freedoms, in a controlled, corrupt fascist government. The future of the world as the CFR sees it.

[BenIsForRon]

Problem is that many of the Chinese had their property stolen by the government. Now, their only option is to work at factories. Sounds like slavery to me.

[swissaustrian]

Consumers in the West shouldn't be buying this stuff knowing how it's produced. The problem is that one can't buy any electronics then, because they're (nearly) all manufactured under these conditions...

[Anti Federalist]

They are slaves, without property rights, without liberties, without freedoms, in a controlled, corrupt fascist government. The future of the world as the CFR sees it.

Thread winner.

Anybody trying to defend this as a "free market" is insane, AFAIC.

[Diurdi]

The mistake most people make is that they compare the working conditions of sweatshop workers to their own Western conditions. You need to compare the conditions in the sweatshops to the alternatives they have, such as working on a farm. Sweatshops are almost always far superior to farmwork.

Slavery is pretty rare in South-east Asian sweatshops actually. In China it's a bit more common.

[GreenBulldog]

The mistake most people make is that they compare the working conditions of sweatshop workers to their own Western conditions. You need to compare the conditions in the sweatshops to the alternatives they have, such as working on a farm. Sweatshops are almost always far superior to farmwork.

That's pretty much the same thing as it was during the industrial revolution in our country.

The only way to get out of sweatshop condition is to increase standard of living, just like we did.

If the Chinese government stop pegging the RMB to the dollar, they would have a higher standard of living (and ours would decrease), so the real tyrant to the Chinese people is the Chinese government.

Like pretty much everything, the usual suspect is the government.

[Warrior_of_Freedom]

Cheap labor like this is exactly what keeps up our lifestyle. If these Chinese workers were being treated like American workers, this thread would be complaining about how an Apple computer costs $10,000.

[LibForestPaul]

Cheap labor like this is exactly what keeps up our lifestyle. If these Chinese workers were being treated like American workers, this thread would be complaining about how an Apple computer costs $10,000.

Apple should just find a country were they can buy some slaves, just feed them for $1 a day. Profits would soar, shareholders would be happy, problem solved.

[onlyrp]

Cheap labor like this is exactly what keeps up our lifestyle. If these Chinese workers were being treated like American workers, this thread would be complaining about how an Apple computer costs $10,000.

exactly, freedom comes from 2 sources, war & exploitation of other countries.

[Brian4Liberty]

The mistake most people make is that they compare the working conditions of sweatshop workers to their own Western conditions. You need to compare the conditions in the sweatshops to the alternatives they have, such as working on a farm. Sweatshops are almost always far superior to farmwork.

So if someone shows us a picture of the poorest person in a country, that is what we call the "alternative"?

Well, in this far off country called the United States, people should be happy to work long hours for low pay in terrible conditions.

Otherwise this is their alternative:

[eric_cartman]

The mistake most people make is that they compare the working conditions of sweatshop workers to their own Western conditions. You need to compare the conditions in the sweatshops to the alternatives they have, such as working on a farm. Sweatshops are almost always far superior to farmwork.

Slavery is pretty rare in South-east Asian sweatshops actually. In China it's a bit more common.

i backpacked around south east asia about 10 years ago... and even though you could tell that these countries were growing and developing and people were improving their quality of life... many of the jobs looked like really hard work.

a lot of people worked in the rice fields. it looks like back breaking labour in really hot weather.

you see people sewing carpets by hand.

and we went to see how they made bricks... and it was a bunch of guys who would hammer big metal spikes into giant boulders and split them in half. and they kept splitting them until they were the size of normal bricks. so these guys were making these bricks just using giant mallets and metal spikes. and the weather there was really hot and these guys had to do this kind of work in the sun all day.

i couldn't imagine having to work that hard for so little money. but i think that working in these "sweatshops" is probably pretty comparable to working in rice fields or doing some of this other manual labour in the hot sun.

[LibForestPaul]

The mistake most people make is that they compare the working conditions of sweatshop workers to their own Western conditions. You need to compare the conditions in the sweatshops to the alternatives they have, such as working on a farm. Sweatshops are almost always far superior to farmwork.

Slavery is pretty rare in South-east Asian sweatshops actually. In China it's a bit more common.

No property rights, no liberty, no freedom = slave.