The Making of a Motherboard at ECS

sheiky writes "Hardcoreware.net has posted a look at the manufacturing process of a motherboard at a new ECS factory in Shen Zhen. Unlike most factories, they build boards from the ground up at one location, starting with the PCB all the way to a finished product. They also talk a little bit about the working conditions they witnessed in China."

Comments

Chinese work conditions

[seanadams.com]

ECS uses the "Grape System" to remind their employees not to slack off. For each day, there is a grape. Green means they had a perfect day, with no problems with work or otherwise. If an employee slacks off or shows up late for work, they get a red grape.

And I toil for what?!? Not so much as a raisin!

Re:Chinese work conditions

[Herkum01]

I love thier last comment about the workers, "I think ECS' employees take great pride in their hard work, even though they are getting paid very little in comparison to bloated unionized factories". There is not a bit of biase there I tell ya!

Re:Chinese work conditions

[Sinbios]

Monetary value and living expenses are also quite different in China, so there's really no comparison there...

Re:Chinese work conditions

[gizmonic]

Perhaps is more Americans saw their work as a source of pride instead of simply a source of income...

And perhaps if companies saw their employees as assests instead of a cost expenditure aganist the bottom line, then maybe more people would care about the quality of their work. Back in the day when you went to work for a company at 18 and expected to work there until you retired, you did see a lot of pride in the work and company. But once companies shifted into that "you better thank us that you even HAVE a job" attitude, the workers attitudes shifted in response.

Remember the day when you bought stocks because the return on your investment was the dividends paid by holding that stock? That's when people had pride in their work. As the value of stocks became the price of the stock itself instead of the dividends, companies began to see anything that cost money as a bad thing, and that includes employee's salaries. That caused a shift in attitudes towards the work force (ie, they are expendable if it we can achieve a higher stock price), which resulted in a shift in attitude from employees.

Granted, I know that's an over simplification and leaves out a LOT of factors, but when you look at the big picture you can't deny the impact of this on the American workforce.

Re:Chinese work conditions

[dal20402]

There has not been a comparable increase in output compared with the increase in wages and benefits

You're right, although not in the way you want to be. Productivity growth in America has vastly outpaced wage growth since the '70s. This applies across unionized and non-unionized industry alike. It doesn't see a rocket scientist to see that the extra money has wound up in the hands of either shareholders or management (depending on how honest management is). Irrespective of the wage question, the productivity growth is what has kept our economy so healthy over most of the last 30 years.

While economists can debate the question until they're blue in the face, there is a credible argument, which I believe, that wider distribution of productivity gains is better for the economy, because money distributed to poorer people is likely to get spent immediately. Beyond a minimum wage/tax subsidy floor, we clearly don't want to achieve that policy goal through regulation of salaries. The best way to distribute money from productivity gains fairly is by equalizing bargaining power and information between labor and investors. How do you accomplish that? Unions and collective bargaining.

Unions are more necessary than ever if we want all Americans to share in the prosperity that their hard work has created through productivity growth. Just because we're not fighting against a 72-hour workweek anymore doesn't mean the basic reason for the existence of unions, to create equal bargaining power for workers, is any less desirable.

With the theory out of the way, I'll address some of your bogus (and oft-repeated by people who have never belonged to a union) examples. I was a government-employed union transit bus driver from 2000 to 2005 (which was a job I loved, incidentally), so perhaps I can clear up some of the misconceptions.

For example, some government workers get paid 40 hours when they only do 37 hours of work.

It's true that some *salaried* government workers work only 35 or 37.5 hours. Their salaries reflect that; they are paid for 35 or 37.5 hours, not 40. As far as hourly workers go, there are some provisions in some contracts that allow a worker to pick up hours without working -- but those are there to guarantee the full-time worker an 8-hour day when it's administratively simpler (for instance, when a bus run happens to return to the garage after 7 hours and 45 minutes thanks to the schedule) for the government not to set up an eight-hour workday. The unions fought hard for that to prevent management from simply shrinking workers' days down to four hours or less. I don't know of any examples of employers otherwise regularly paying employees for more hours than they work -- why not just raise the hourly rate instead?

Toll-booth workers get upwards of $25 an hour to stand there and hand out tickets.

I can't find any toll-collector wage over $21 in the country. Most of them are closer to $16. It's dirty, repetitive, unrewarding, dangerous (people like to rob tollbooths) and potentially injurious (to hearing, especially) work. Most toll collectors don't hand out tickets (there are machines for that) but count money. Would you consider it progress if we paid them minimum wage, they couldn't afford decent housing anymore, and turnover in these high-accountability positions (lots of cash handled) were suddenly 200%?

Government construction workers get paid somewheres around that same rate to stand around all day (honestly - do you EVER see these guys working?)

Everyone whines about this. So why aren't you on a state road crew? The jobs aren't that hard to get. People complain, but when the chips are down they realize these guys have tough jobs.

If you see a worker standing, it's probably because he's acting as a safety spotter for someone else you can't see. When you're dealing with heavy machinery and dangerous chemicals all day, it's worth

Re:Chinese work conditions

[jonin]

It's true that some *salaried* government workers work only 35 or 37.5 hours. Their salaries reflect that; they are paid for 35 or 37.5 hours, not 40.

Sometimes it is even worse. I am a city employee (firefighter) salaried at a 40 hr week but have to work a 46.7 hr week. Granted I am supposed to have 6.7 hours of sleep at work but that never happens because we are one of the busiest stations.

Re:Chinese work conditions

[Vlad2.0]

The best way to distribute money from productivity gains fairly is by equalizing bargaining power and information between labor and investors. How do you accomplish that? Unions and collective bargaining.

I'd say that the fairest method is by companies competing for the workforce. Locking Employer and Employee in and endless struggle against each other is neither fair nor a good solution to the problem (what if I don't want to be in a union? Not so fair them is it?) Healthy competition has served us quite well in recent history.

Unions are more necessary than ever if we want all Americans to share in the prosperity that their hard work has created through productivity growth. Just because we're not fighting against a 72-hour workweek anymore doesn't mean the basic reason for the existence of unions, to create equal bargaining power for workers, is any less desirable.

No. A more balanced import and export sheet with the rest of the world and a great (high) education system will ensure American prosperity in the future. Modernization would be a boon as well. Relatively few Americans' hard work has created the productivity growth we've seen (I attribute most of that growth to the baby boomers). Some American's also don't deserve to share in those benefits. Prosperity is not a guarantee in life, nor should it be.

Having also worked in a union myself (not for the big G however), it's laughable to say that the basic reason for the existence of unions is to create equal bargaining power for workers. That might have been true a century ago when there were no such thing as child labor laws, the 40 hour work week, minimum wage, etc, but it is, quite frankly, a stupid reason to argue for their existence now. The laws are in place, they're not going anywhere, the workers have won...and there was much rejoicing.

Let me give some examples of how unions have failed America:

1. Cough. The automobile industry. 'nuff said.

2. Longshore union. They pretty much get first dibs on stuff coming in from over seas, and anything that goes, uh, "missing" is just shrinkage that gets added to the cost of business (read: we pay for it). Despite their jobs being completely useless in an age of robots, they've somehow terrorized shipping companies and lawmakers into giving them the 5 finger discount, 6 figure salaries, and pensions. How hard do they work? Most of them sit on their ass and watch machines do the work they used to do (it's okay to use a machine as long as you still pay the man who's job is being taken over). Useful!

3. If you lived in Southern California you should remember the strike that took place a few years ago in many grocery stores (Vons/Safeway). Not only do these people get paid damn good money for work that requires nothing more than a high school education, they had full healthcare benefits. Why'd they strike? Cause "The Man" wanted them to pay a co-pay like the rest of us. Solution: a strike that will eventually allow other nonunionized grocery chains to overtake them. Nothing says short term profit like long term unemployment!

4. Unionized government labor. Yes, I realize the parent here is one of those people. Thanks to this bullshit (read: pension plans) the City of San Diego is for all practical purposes bankrupt. Mmm. Fiscal 2007 budget: $2.6 billion. Pension fund deficit: $1.43 billion. Solution: cut funding to everything that doesn't have "political suicide" written on it and raise taxes. Sure am glad we have unions! (source: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/pension/2 0060619-9999-1n19bankrupt.html

5. I would say that the downfall of American construction/manufacturing is directly tied to unions who tried to keep jobs no matter what. The resulting inability to compete in the global marketplace doomed the corporations that employed them. I wonder how many familys w

Re:Chinese work conditions

[Mark4ST]

Where are the workers over thirty?

Re:Chinese work conditions

[VeXteR]

What you describe is caused by the mindset that: If a company doesnt INCREASE its profits yearly, they are failing. Most companies cannot meet this demand without targeting the workers. Publicly traded stock is what cuases this problem.

Re:Chinese work conditions

[Hans Lehmann]

Monetary value and living expenses are also quite different in China, so there's really no comparison there..

But not for long.... From today's Los Angeles Times, soon workers in China will reap the benefits of our glorious HMO medical care system, thanks to companies here in the US with double-plus-good names like 'Sunnylife Global', for which they're billed $375 per annum, plus copayments.

Re:Chinese work conditions

[frank_adrian314159]

Thanks to this bullshit (read: pension plans) the City of San Diego is for all practical purposes bankrupt.

Uh, excuse me? Last time I heard, the main reason that SD was bankrupt was because the folks in charge of investing the money in the SD public employee pension fund did a piss poor job of investing (mainly by focusing large amounts of money on derivative contracts). Blaming this on the employees is incredibly stupid. Or do you think that employees don't have the right to ask for pensions? Top level execs seem to have no problem doing this (last I heard Jack Welch was getting millions of dollars a year in pension benefits from GE; he's not the only one). But I guess they're entitled.

Re:Chinese work conditions

[dal20402]

Relatively few Americans' hard work has created the productivity growth we've seen (I attribute most of that growth to the baby boomers). Some American's also don't deserve to share in those benefits.

I'd like to see some support for this. The data I've seen suggests the productivity gains have been extraordinarily broad-based. Managers deserve some of the credit, as IT and implementation of continually more efficient logistical procedures have helped workers get more done. But workers deserve credit as well. From the bottom to the top, we're working more hours, taking less vacation, and using more effective time-management techniques.

I don't know who you are referring to when you say "some Americans don't deserve to share," but I believe if a worker is more productive that worker should be rewarded accordingly. A perfectly working market would ensure that by offering the worker another job if he were not paid in accordance with his productivity. But when there are the sort of large-scale, systemic differences in bargaining power that you see between individuals and large corporations, the market doesn't work perfectly. Unions are the perfect tool to right that balance, since they allow the market to function with equal bargaining power and without regulation.

The laws are in place, they're not going anywhere, the workers have won...

Not so fast. We've seen steady erosion in the real minimum wage, repeated attempts to exclude more and more workers from overtime protections, weakening of ergonomic protections, shrinkage of worker's comp benefits, lackadaisical enforcement of basic things like lunch breaks and safety rules, and administration-sponsored attempts to replace entire classes of well-protected jobs with insecure, low-paying bottom-rung ones. It's not like the same forces that led to 72-hour workweeks in the bad old days have magically gone away. Preserving workplace sanity, like preserving freedom, requires constant vigilance.

1. Cough. The automobile industry. 'nuff said.

The union's job is not to respond to long-term trends in a product market. That's management's job. While perhaps a more perceptive group of unions would have structured the big health care and retirement programs differently, to allow for more flexibility, the real blame can be squarely laid on the lazy management that failed to see the Japanese carmakers right under its nose in the '60s and '70s.

2. Longshore union.

Say what? These guys are still killed at the rate of several a year. They are killed in the most gruesome imaginable ways: crushed by containers, sent flying a quarter mile by snapping cables, falling 100 feet from cranes, etc. It's probably the most dangerous union job there is, and one of the most dangerous in the country. Yes, machines are doing some work they used to do, but they put themselves in physical danger for the sake of a critical step in our economic process. They deserve every cent they get.

3 ... Why'd they strike? Cause "The Man" wanted them to pay a co-pay like the rest of us.

I can never quite get my head around this argument. What you are saying is "With my artificially low bargaining power I can't get a proper medical plan. Therefore no one else should get it either, even if they were smart enough to band together to negotiate as an equal with the company."

If the workers at the non-union stores were to organize, they could get that health plan as well. So could you. Protect your interests. Don't enable someone who's trying to ensure that you get a below-market outcome for their own benefit.

4 ... Thanks to this bullshit (read: pension plans) the City of San Diego is for all practical purposes bankrupt. Mmm. Fiscal 2007 budget: $2.6 billion. Pension fund deficit: $1.43 billion.

And this is the union's fault how? Again, it was bad fiscal management by the city that got it into this mess. The pension plan was

Dupe

[Ramble]

Bit-Tech did this over a week ago.

http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/2006/06/16/ecs_shen_z hen_factory_tours/1.html

Was this article written by the Chinese?

[x_man]

I think ECS' employees take great pride in their hard work, even though they are getting paid very little in comparison to bloated unionized factories in North America.

Yes, how dare those union workers try to get things like livable wages, child labor laws and health insurance. What were those silly Americans thinking?

X

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[WilliamSChips]

You have committed thoughtcrime. Unions doubleplusungood. -Republican Administration

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[thejam]

Here, here! I nearly lost my lunch at the suggestion that taking lower wages for longer hours and with a public ridicule "grape" system is somehow more efficient? For whom? Your therapist?

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[contrapunctus]

I think ECS' employees take great pride in their hard work, even though they are getting paid very little in comparison to bloated unionized factories in North America.

Yes, how dare those union workers try to get things like livable wages, child labor laws and health insurance. What were those silly Americans thinking?

There was a show on PBS last friday about GM paying off workers to quit. One instance was a janitor (in a union) making nearly twice as much as me. I'm a college professor. Why did I go to school for so long?

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[lowlight852]

Yeah! Let the unionized janitor make $20 USD per hour mobbing garbage while his company loses millions every year, eventually going bankrupt! The simple fact that he is alive and can walk and breathe gives him the RIGHT!

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[ettlz]

As a Brit, I really cannot understand the crazy phobia (some) Americans have about unions and socialism. "Ooer! Reds!" Let's not forget these movements arose out of injustice. OK, so they got out of hand in the UK in the 1970s, but things are generally stable nowadays and we're not [yet] slaves to The Party. Many other west-European states have systems with a socialist slant, and they're not doing too bad either. Is socialism a dirty word, automatically equated with communism or something? Is it un-American to disclaim the class system, and ensure that one's neighbours do not starve or suffer ill-health?

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[goofyheadedpunk]

So you didn't have to be a janitor?

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[Skidge]

Why did I go to school for so long?

I know I'd rather be doing academic work in a field I'm interested in than punching a clock to clean tobacco spit out of trashcans or to clean up after someone's explosive diarrhea, especially if you get paid enough as a professor to live relatively comfortably.

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[contrapunctus]

It was a little bit of a rhetorical question but yes everybody's answer is right.
It still bothers me though.

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[Znork]

"so out of control that domestic industries can no longer compete"

As you're handing out the criticism, dont forget to mention the other side of the coin. How about 'intellectual property legislation so out of control that domestic workers can no longer compete'.

Unions arent alone in driving spiralling costs. Rent-seeking is rife in the whole economy.

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[coldmist]

Yes, socialism is a dirty word, since it and communism have the same end goal, just different means of getting there.

The problem with Unions, IMHO, is that they concentrate power, which in turn gets corrupted. Once a factory goes union, is there an option to "opt-out"? Do I have the "freedom" to not be union while my co-worker is? Since there isn't, that power tends to corruption. A classic example is teachers unions. The teachers are paid from property taxes (here in the US anyway), which they then pay Union dues. Then, if a lawsuit comes up, the state uses more tax money to handle a lawsuit which is being defended by money that came from taxes in the first place. The system just feeds itself.

As a final point, you said "Is it un-American to disclaim the class system, and ensure that one's neighbours do not starve or suffer ill-health?"

Well, the difference is we (speaking broadly here) would rather deal with a starving neighbor on a personal level through personal generosity and donations/gifts than to have the money taken by us through taxes, and then paid out to other people that might or might not deserve it or use it wisely. If I knew that an honest neighbor was starving to death, I would go to the store, by $100 worth of groceries for example, and give them to them. However, I would not do the same for a neighbor that is a drunk and is wasting his money on booze. What happens in socialized welfare is the government does not/can not make a distinction between the two and take $300 from me (the government programs are expensive to administer, right) and give $100 cash to each of my neighbors.

See the reports about the money that went to Hurricane Katrina victims. See this article for a quick example: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la- na-fema15jun15,0,1306432.story?coll=la-home-headli nes

Ultimately, it boils down to the individual being responsible for ones own actions, having both the ability to succeed (like Bill Gates) and the possiblity of failure. You can't have one without the other. In a Union (at a factory level) or socialism/communism (a national level), a safety net is erected to prevent failure. The same mechanism also stunts success.

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[Skynyrd]

It's not a "crazy phobia" when the union is so out of control that domestic industries can no longer compete with foreign ones. This, incidentally, is why Ford and (especially) GM are getting their asses handed to them by foreign companies: Toyota, Honda, Hyundai etc. are building factories here that employ Americans at low, non-union wages, while Ford and GM are closing factories because they're drowning in pension payments to their unionized workers. The union is so powerful -- too powerful -- that it's actually driving jobs away and hurting both the economy and the workers themselves.

How come you don't mention Daimler-Chrysler in your condemnation of the unions? DC has the same union contracts that GM and Ford have. They have the same "lazy union workers" that Ford and GM have.

However, DC is making huge profits. Actually, the Daimler (Mercedes) end of the company is losing money and the Chrysler arm is keeping Mercedes alive.

How do they do it with all those lazy, overpaid union guys? Perhaps they have good designers, managers, marketeers and engineers?

If every GM car was as good as a new 'Vette or Cad, perhaps they'd be making more profit? Perhaps if they stopped making ugly, shitty cars that get bad mileage they'd sell a few more? No, it's easier to blame the unions.

One more thought about lazy union guys.
Bud, Miller and Coors make interchangeable products. Sure, there are slight differences between the three brands, but for the most part, the difference is the marketing, not the product.

Since Coors isn't unionized, it sells for much less monry than Bud and Miller, right? And Miller is a little cheaper than Bud, because theire union guys make less than Bud.

What? That's not the case? You mean that Coors makes more profit per can because they sell a product made for less labor cost for the same money and just keep the profit difference

Fucking lazy union guys.

I've worked union and non-union shops. Sure, there's some built in slop when you have a union. On the other hand, the non-union shops I've worked in are so dangerous it can be terrifying to work there. I've worked in education, IT and metal fabrication. I'm currently half owner of a family business, and we won't unionize because there's only an occasional employee. However, we treat them well, and pay them far more than prevailking wages.

Re:Was this article written by the Chinese?

[Firehed]

Nah. Most Americans don't even know what Socialism is - like Communism, it's just another dirty word.

Unions

[tinrobot]

even though they are getting paid very little in comparison to bloated unionized factories in North America.

Not to get on too much of a rant... but we can thank unions for a lot of things... like weekends off and decent salaries. Without unions, we'd still be working seven days a week in sweatshops.

Sadly, China has no unions, so they do have sweatshops and low wages. I'd argue that China's workers would be better off if they did form unions.

(and... before everyone here starts moaning about their employers, yes, I know many of you do work very long work weeks in the tech business. I've worked for several startups myself)

Re:Unions

[pete-classic]

China is still Communist, right? So the workers control the means of production. So who the hell is the union going to fight?

-Peter

Re:Unions

[thelost]

hardly surprising considering the whole article reads like a paid for advertisement and actually goes into little/no detail about the manufacturing process.

Re:Unions

[Anonymous Coward]

China is still Communist, right?

Wrong. China is a fascist oligarchy which is no closer to communism than America is. In fact, less so. Many workers in China's buliding industry are not paid at all until their (possibly years long) project is over, and the rural regions have been decimated by the withdrawl of all education and health services. Violent uprisings in China, by China's own figures, reached 87000 last year and have increased steadily by more than 10% per year for some time.

China is on the edge of exploding into civil war and what I think would seem strange to Americans is that when it comes the people doing the rebelling will probably be fighting to establish communism, which they've been raised to believe in because it was a good way to control them but have never experienced.

Re:Unions

[wbean]

I think it's more complicated than this. Employers respond to the environment around them. They must offer pay/working conditions thar are good enough in comparison to the other alternatives to allow them to attract employees. They must NOT offer pay/working conditions that are so good that they drive up costs to the point where the firm can't function. It's hard to generalize but most employers that I know would like to be able to offer good pay and conditions. Often they simply don't feel able - I know, this isn't universally true but it's probably more true than most people believe.

The conditions in China are vastly different from the conditions here. If an employer in China - whether on his/her own or led by a union - offered Western pay/conditions they would quickly be driven out of business. They simply couldn't compete. On the other hand, the pay/conditions that are being offered are enough better than life on the farm that millions of people flock to the new jobs every year. China has a tremendous balancing act to perform. They have to keep pay down enough to create the huge number of new jobs that they need to absorb all the people leaving the farm. At the same time they have to build imfrastructure, tackle their environmental problems and raise living conditions enough to avoid unrest. Not an enviable task. I doubt that unions would be much help at this stage.

Re:Unions

[grumling]

Actually, Unions came into the picutre after the pay scale in factories went up. We really have Henry Ford to thank for high pay in factories, mostly because he couldn't keep people in his factories until he raised the pay scale... although one could argue that the high turnover was more due to the lousy working conditions than the low pay, but the pay seemed to work. It should be pointed out that most of his employees were sons of farmers (who weren't used to factory work), and craftsmen who put a much higher emphasis on quality workmanship over production output. Ford management was much more interested in output and price. In fact, Ford (the company) wanted a poorly built vehicle so to encourage more purchases (one of the first cases of planned obsolescence).

We have Unions to thank for 8 hour work day (although it seems to have dissapeared over the past few years), bathroom breaks, and realistic expectations on production (at least in factories). Once the pay scale went up in Ford's factories, the output jumped up, since there was a better pool available. However, Ford and Wall St. expected the output to continue to increase year over year, and so the line was sped up. At one point the workers were not permitted to leave the line for any reason. This led to the famous piss cans, and ultimately to a strike, a union, and some really disturbing communist artwork.

I'm really not suprised that people look at China and see "sweatshops" while totally ignoring the poverty level in the countryside. Perhaps they would like to see China have a second revolution to democracy, just like the former USSR? Yep, that would be much better than a measured attempt to introduce capitalist reforms to a broken system. At least Mexico might be better off.

Re:Unions

[grumling]

Perhaps you'd like to see China end up like the former USSR, with the mafia running the show, no accounting for weapons of mass distruction, and no economy? Bad enough with 300 million... how about 1.5 billion?

Re:Unions

[NanoGriever]

>Also most of the workers are women, who are considered a 2nd class human in China,
>the fact that they are allowed to work at all is a big step for them.

You obviously don't know much about China and you just make stuff up.
Chinese women have been working hard for years. How and where you got
that idea is totally beyond me. May be you've mistaken China for some
countries in the middle east?

Re:Unions

[Anonymous Coward]

More info please. If China is really on the edge of civil war, the American propaganda machine would not let the Chinese propaganda machine keep it a secret.

A good place to start is Antony Thomas' film "Tank Man" about the famous film of the guy who blocked the tanks' advance into Tienanmen Square.

The American propaganda machine is confused by huge amounts of money to be made out of China's slave labour. That's good for capitalism, just as it was under the Nazi's when Hitler's Germany was the only European country where US investment increased (and at the incredible rate of 48% over just a few years) so a solution has to be found which allows China to be "most favoured trading nation" but official disapproval of communism still expressed.

The solution settled on seems to be to pretend that the Chinese government "has seen the light" and is introducing capitalism. This can be painted as a victory for western values while the reality that the vast majority of China is still available for work at what might as well be zero pay can be used to make massive profits for multi-nationals who are "in" with the Oligarchs who rule it.

The new middle classes in China are shiney and bright but they are a tiny minority in a vast sea of repressed people on the edge of starvation with a life expectancy which is actually decreasing. They look good in documentaries about the upcomming Chinese Olympics and suchlike but their real purpose is to make a west-friendly face for investment and political photo-ops.

Re:Unions

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Perhaps they would like to see China have a second revolution to democracy, just like the former USSR?

Although I am too lazy to dig up links to the online citations - from what I have read - one of the largest causes of the economic problems in the former USSR was Wall Street & the US government's poorly conceived and even more poorly executed attempts to "jumpstart" a captalist system over there after the fall of socialism.

In extremely simplistic terms, they simply threw money at the situation without much in the way of accountability. The end result, as is always the case when accountability is not a strong requirement, was endemic corruption.

From the tone of the reports I've seen, Russia would probably be a whole lot more democratic with decently competitive free markets if the US had just left it alone to sort things out on its own after the revolution. Instead, they got the equivalent of the dot-com-bomb - tons of companies spending willy-nilly in order to "get in on the ground floor" who eventually abandonded the country to the aftermath of all that poorly spent money and political 'advising.'

Scary...

[ThinkingInBinary]

All of these motherboard factory tours (there have been a few) are pretty scary. We see the really cool equipment, and get to hear the tests each piece of hardware goes through, and then we hear about how their employees do really repetitive tasks, for low wages, with tough ("military-style"), if not abusive, bosses, in an insulting environment (the "grape system"?! What are they, kindergarteners?!?!). Sure, they're efficient, and the product is relatively cheap, but do we want to support the ways these companies treat their workers, even if it's "okay" with the workers?

Re:Scary...

[timjdot]

That's par for the course in manufacturing. Clearly the author never worked in a board plant in the USA - a few decades ago there were many. Interns and hourly Manpower workers did the repetitive tasks. The company where I worked tried automation and had a tour by Bush I - or maybe it was Reagan - about how great that was but in the end variances cannot be handled well by robots/machines and only certain tasks could be automated (wave solder, surface mount, moving parts from one line to another).
From the looks of it these are young adults very similar to the college students and part-time folks who used to do the work in the USA for about 2x minimum wage.

Assembly and manufacturing are not as glamorous as some seem to expect. A challenging QA task nonetheless. Odd to see little to no advancement over what was being done two decades ago. Just moved to a lower cost/lower net tax load locale.

TimJowers
P.S> There was no union in the plant where I worked. And, of course, the work eventually was offshored. I think the remnant now defines new processes when new products are to be run and then the bulk is done in Mexico, Tiawan, or such.

Re:Scary...

[mattkime]

>>but do we want to support the ways these companies treat their workers, even if it's "okay" with the workers?

The success of walmart would imply a resounding "Yes!"

Re:Scary...

[Sinbios]

How, exactly, are the workers being mistreated? Regular lectures? A merit system? Just because it seems scary to a Westerner doesn't mean it's scary to anybody else. In fact, the factory practices are pretty compliant with Asian values - merit and discipline. The entire Chinese education system was built around these values - every morning, we'd stand in neat rows and listen to the anthem, do morning exercises, and then get a lecture from the principal; in school if we do something good we receive a slip of paper, which could eventually be redeem for rewards. Thus, workplace practices are merely a continuation of that and perfectly normal to any Chinese person. This happens in Japanese workplaces as well.
Just because it's different from what you're used to and you can't understand it doesn't make it something horrible. People need to realize that the majority of the population in modern China don't live in shitholes or scrabble for a living by putting up with a shitty job and abuse. Assembly line jobs in China are perfectly respectable - in fact, it's the same in Canada, where I live; assembly line labourers make quite a tidy sum compared to other manual labourers. No abuse going on here, move right along.

Slanted?

[Skuld-Chan]

I think ECS' employees take great pride in their hard work, even though they are getting paid very little in comparison to bloated unionized factories in North America.

They make it sound like a good thing! Unions get little credit (even in China) for the 40 hour work week, paid time off, or time off at all.

Re:Slanted?

[Anonymous Coward]

You have to see it from the other side too. At United Parcel Service I saw firsthand how evil both sides are. I remember managers telling supervisors to do things that were just plain wrong. For example, packages would move down a conveyor belt at a particular speed. The guys at the end of the belt would need to wait an extra 3-5 minutes before packages started arriving to be loaded. For this reason, supervisors were told to stagger the start times of the back employees 5-10 minutes later to save a few dollars each day. This was so patently ridiculous but it was policy. Policy that was not always told to the employees. The reasoning was that they needed to be in their work area before start time and be prepared to load when packages arrived. In other words, work for free setting up for the first ten minutes because that's our policy.

How about the union (Teamsters)? I visited a facility once dressed in a suit and tie (I was in IT). My job was to show employees how to work a bar code scanner for a new tracking system. As I was talking to the employee two large guys (also in suits) arrived and stood on either side of me. I picked up a Next Day Air letter to show how to scan (I thought they were managers checking my training procedure). Nope, soon as I touched the letter one guy shouts out, "What the fuck you doing? You're not supposed to touch packages." He tells me that he can shut down the entire facility in a second and that I shouldn't be touching packages. He's shouting two inches from my face. At this point the facility manager comes by and starts talking with the union guys to smooth things over.

Management and unions (at least the ones at UPS) are just a bunch of pricks looking for money. They're both evil. The problem is that you let one group get the upper hand and it may be even worse (look at the current political parties in the US for a similar thing).

Re:Slanted?

[loraksus]

To say nothing of workplace health and safety standards. I'll put money down that 25%+ of those employees will have some kind of cancer before they turn 50 and 40% will be dead before they turn 60. Some of the chemicals used are pretty nasty shit.
The "company store / housing" thing is also popular in China - the factory mandates that you live in their dorms and eat their food - even they are overpriced (hundreds of percent) and substandard. The article claims that the housing is "included" although you can take that a couple different ways.

Re:Slanted?

[batkiwi]

I worked for UPS for about 9 months after highschool, during Uni. On my start day, we filled out our HR paperwork and then were walked about 10 meters offsite to a trailer (like the ones used at schools with too many students) and sat down at desks to learn about "the teamsters." Two HUGE guys (6'2", 250lb type guys) come in to inform us about our option to join the union. The speech was (paraphrased from memory 10 years ago):

"We're your local union reps. You sign these papers and we automatically deduct your union fees from your wages. Does anyone not want to join the union? [pause] Good."

Now there was nothing DIRECTLY threatening, but as an 18 year old I wasn't about to raise my hand and point out that I'd not like to join the union...

I fully believe his story.

What unions are getting...

[Illbay]

...is much, much smaller.

ECS at Frys

[Anonymous Coward]

I work a Fry's Electronics. The rurmor at my store is is that ECS is owned by Fry's. I have never seen or heard anything to validate or disprove that, so take it with a grain of salt.
Anywho, regardless of ownership, ECS products are the favorite things to sell at Fry's. From the ECS motherboards to their Great Quality branded computers and notebooks.

As an employee in the service department (and thus, responisble for repairing computers when they fail) I can tell you the anything made by ECS is complete dirt. The GQ computers are not too bad, but I have never seen so many DOA motherboards in my life. We had a customer buy a mobo/cpu combo last week and his board was DOA. We ended up going though SIX (yes "6") more boards before we found one that would actually work.

DO NOT BUY ECS PRODUCTS.

Re:ECS at Frys

[MsGeek]

Ex-Fry's worker over here. I doubt Fry's owns ECS. They're too cheap to do something like buy out a supplier.

ECS stuff is CRAP though. Absolute fsckn crap. As well as ECS, "Great Quality" and PC Chips, stay away from anything labeled Amptron. Same company. Same "Great Quality" meaning none.

ECS Extreme

[llZENll]

"Once packaged, random boards are put through shock tests to make sure their lot will survive the shipping process. The number of boards that go through this testing procedure is higher for high end products such as ECS' "EXTREME" lineup."

So if you buy an EXTREME board and get pissed at your computer, you can throw it a little harder against the wall. Cool!

Cheap labor makes it all go

[Animats]

Here's are pictures from a US manufacturer of PC boards. Notice how it's done. No long row of women putting in components; it's one guy standing around watching the machines do the work. Automated insertion machines put in the components, and transfer conveyors connect the machines. That's the way it should be.

Only the really low wages of China make labor-intensive manual assembly feasible. Even in Mexico, you'd use automated assembly. Assembly in Japan has been automated for decades. If the US imposed import duties on very-low-wage countries that equalized wage costs to even $1/hour, this excessive "offshoring" would stop.

Re:Cheap labor makes it all go

[FooAtWFU]

If the US imposed import duties on very-low-wage countries that equalized wage costs to even $1/hour, this excessive "offshoring" would stop.

Is that a good thing? If the machines do most of the work, that means some human isn't getting paid for the work. Don't we want to pay people? Especially the poorest sorts of people in the world? Why aren't we thanking these manufacturers for giving these workers jobs, which are apparently better than any of the other opportunities which are available to them? I know it's not the Coziest Job In the World, but should they have to offer All the Luxuries of the West and a 2-week vacation to Hawaii every year before hiring anyone? Do you really think these people would be Amazingly Better Off if they were unemployed instead?

bad boards

[cdn-programmer]

bad boards - how to recognise and avoid them

http://www.redhill.net.au/b/b-bad.html

This section, however, is not about the normal variation in quality and reliability between typical motherboards. It is about plain old-fashioned greed, and the cheap, shonky boards that sometimes result from it. Here then, is a short gallery of the cheap, the nasty, and the outright fraudulent.

To quote for the Red Hill web page:

PC Chips fake cache 486

Let's begin with the most famous of them all: the fake cache 486 boards that PC Chips produced in the mid-Nineties.

---------------

From the PCCHIPS website we find: http://www.pcchips.com.tw/PCCWeb/AboutCOMPANY/Abou tCOMPANY.aspx?MenuID=8&LanID=2

PCCHIPS has been a leading supplier of motherboards and PC peripherals since 1994. We are committed to provide products of superior value and exemplary customer service to our customers worldwide.

http://www.pcchips.com.tw/PCCWeb/Legal.aspx?MenuID =8&LanID=2

The materials ("Materials") contained in this web site are provided by Elitegroup Computer Systems Co., Ltd. ("ECS") ...

I think these quotes speak for themselves.

Worker's Paradise

[Doc Ruby]

The last page has the completely naive part about working conditions. The reviewer, Carl Nelson, has no way to know whether the redfaced employee was just embarassed at their bad day report being photographed, or whether there are severe punishments. China's mafia government executes people for software/content piracy, among other fascist means of keeping people in line with their "discipline". They routinely torture people for interfering with official government policy.

(FWIW, I'm not comparing China to the US or elsewhere, where there is also too much torture and executions, for whatever reason. There is no relativism that justifies torturing people, certainly not over economics.)

The first page has the claim that "Pretty soon every computer you buy is going to have an ECS motherboard in it!" Although that's probably just wrong, it shows how naive is the reviewer about the real world outside motherboard specs. If it were true, I'd be worried about a single company, a single factory (which can halt or be destroyed) representing a single point of failure for every computer in the world, or even (especially) in the US.

That article is about as analytical as a videogame review. That is, not at all, after being bought off by a free trip to the factory where their toys get made.

Just like in America

[quokkapox]

Only the really low wages of China make labor-intensive manual assembly feasible.

It's great here in America, we have these "Wal*Mart" stores everywhere... the "employees" are automated here too. When they wear out (or get sick), new ones automatically sign up to take their place. You don't have to worry about repairing the broken employees (i.e. health care); there's a constant supply of new ones. I'm not sure what happens to the worn-out ones; I think the government has some sort of program for recycling them.

They stock the shelves better than robots could (usually), and some of them can even answer natural language queries (in english and spanish) about the location of inventory.

Re:Just like in America

[Sponge Bath]

I think the government has some sort of program for recycling them.

Tuesday is Soylent Green day...

Been there, seen that

[EMacAonghusa]

I've been to some of those factories in Shenzhen, been down around the manufacturing lines too. So here's a few general observations based on my own experiences - First thing that struck me is that this guy managed to get photos! The places I visited even our mobile phones were taken from us before we entered the manufacturing area, we'd be in deep shit with security if we pulled out a camera to take pictures. You'll also notice pictures of products there ... majour security breech in my opinion! - Secondly look what they're making, look at the cleanliness of the place. It's the reason many western countries are in trouble ... because in China they have the skills to make high-end products and they can do it cheaper and faster than the rest of us. Plus they are very highly motivated and their entire philospoy seems to be to get as much work from everywhere as they can, even if it means making a loss ... anything to take the work from us. That's why everything from the Playstation to mobile phones to the iPod is produced in China. - About working conditions ... China is one place you do NOT want to work. Workers do seem to be treated fairly well however they are not paid much, if they are not on specific shifts then they will work VERY long hours, even through holidays and very often through the whole weekend. Many of the places they live are really shit by western standards. Also, the working environment itself is often cramped. Much of the work is manual and there is little or no variation to it, so it's likely to make you brain dead after a while. Another thing that stinks is that you'll often find employees from Taiwan working there .. they will always be on a higher salary than the local Chinese, even if they are doing the very same job. Nice people though, they put up with a lot of shit.

Union Mafia bastards!

[mobby_6kl]

Since everyone else here decided to skip all the boring talk about the technology involved and jump right into a flamewar, I hereby submit my contribution.

What are your sources?

[mr_stinky_britches]

Can you provide references citing your claims about executing people for piracy, and torturing?

Your off-the-cuff claims and lack of cited references leads me to believe you have no idea what you are talking about..

Please prove me wrong, I hope you can..

Thanks

Union bashing scab...

[gorehog]

Some people may question the working conditions in China. Well, there's a lot to question about human rights in China, but I won't get into that rant here. I can say from what I've seen, that the employees at ECS are efficient and hard working, but I don't think they are put through abuse.

Followed by...

Employees can work an 8 hour shift if they want, but most opt to work a full 12 hour overtime shift.

Ever try working 5,6, or 7 12-hour shifts in one week? That's 60-82 hours in one week. Sevceral weeks in a row? And thats not considered abuse? What am I supposed to call it? Opportunity?

And then there's this tidbit...

There are several benefits and bonuses available for those who perform well, and housing is provided as part of their salary.

I'll take for granted that the reward system is voluntary by the employer so as to keep the workers "motivated" and "guessing" about what their work is actually "worth". I am also sure that the quality of housing is not in line with that of an American Union worker who puts in a 60-82 hour workweek. And, I'll bet that the housing cost is figured in as part of their pay. We used to do this to coal miners in the USA, where they would go live in a house they rented from the company they worked for and bought their groceries at the company store. It's one of the reasons that Appalachia is so isolated from the rest of the USA culturally. Because the coal mines were in such remote places they had no other opportunities and as a result got locked into a cycle of employed poverty for generation after generation.

And finally, I live in Poughkeepsie NY. Right near the heart of traditional IBM hq. We have chip fabrication ALL OVER this region with NO UNIONS involved. Where are the bloated union electronics factories he speaks of?

A number of separate issues are being fudged...

[ofcourseyouare]

A number of separate issues are being fudged in some of these posts...

Q1: Are working conditions in countries such as China perfect by our standards?
A: Obviously not, too strict.

Q2&3: Are working conditions good enough by their standards? Are working conditions better than, for example, working on a peasant farm?
A: Yes, otherwise why would they work there? There's plenty of peasant farms in China -- people are leaving them in droves.

Q3: Will working in such standards help raise the wealth of China so that in years hence they can afford to have our standard of living -- along with real unions, health care, etc.
A: Yes - globalisation in East Asia has brought about the greatest mass liberation from poverty in the history of the planet. For interesting data, check out:
http://hdr.undp.org/statistics/data/
Click on Human development trends 2005 NEW !

Q4: How would China be without globalisation?
A: Check out Burma or North Korea, both of which are following their own roads to paradise.

Q5: Is the rise of such factories a challenge to labour in developed countries?
A: Yes of course - globalisation is not a zero sum game -- it does make all coutnries better off -- but jobs will go where they can be done cheapest. And that does include a lot of skilled tech jobs.

Q6: Is the rise of China accompanied by extra pollution?
A: You bet.

However, I believe it's worth it overall -- a country as big as China is never going to be raised from poverty through our charity. It needs industry. This will be accompanied, as it was in the West, by pollution, and also by job losses. But everyone reading this has reaped the benefits of industrialisation (computers don't grow on trees), now it's their turn.

Re:A number of separate issues are being fudged...

[ScrewMaster]

However, I believe it's worth it overall -- a country as big as China is never going to be raised from poverty through our charity. It needs industry. This will be accompanied, as it was in the West, by pollution, and also by job losses. But everyone reading this has reaped the benefits of industrialisation (computers don't grow on trees), now it's their turn.

You may believe that. I'm sure you do. But all I know is that I'm earning a lot more than I was when I entered the work force twenty-six years ago, yet have less buying power than I've ever had, and frankly don't perceive a future that's anywhere near as bright as you seem to make it. Sure, globalization may not be a zero-sum game ... but the net effect, at this point in time, is a massive transfer of wealth from the West to the East. That's just the way it is. And if you were to ask me if I'm happy about the ongoing decline in the United States' standard-of-living due to the destruction of our domestic industries by Chinese imports ... well no, I'm not, particularly. Japan started the process with our consumer electronics manufacturing, and now China seems poised to finish it with everything else. The article said it quite clearly: they'll do anything if it takes the business away from us. About the only thing in that article with which I agree, frankly. And your overweening concern for the plight of the Chinese worker is almost endearing but the reality is that China and the United States are locked a brutal economic struggle. China, for a number of reasons (first and foremost the remarkable ethical lapses exhibited by our various Captains of Industry and their paid government officials) is winning, and the outcome for the U.S. population will be serious.

I've heard too many people carry on about the supposed benefits of what is variously termed "globalization" or the "global economy". I have yet to see any of these mythical benefits, in fact, so far as I'm concerned all that is happening is just an example of involuntary foreign aid from the United States to China. So be it. But don't try to sugar-coat what is really going on. China is not interested in economic competition with the United States. It wants to eliminate the U.S. from the world scene as a viable competitor.

Re:A number of separate issues are being fudged...

[Artifakt]

Q2&3: Are working conditions good enough by their standards? Are working conditions better than, for example, working on a peasant farm?
A: Yes, otherwise why would they work there? There's plenty of peasant farms in China -- people are leaving them in droves.

It's worth noting that this isn't an automatically safe assumption. Much of Africa, right now, has a huge influx of people from the farms to the cities, but there is little or no economic growth (often there's profoundly negative growth instead), and it doesn't seem increased job opportunities or quality of life are driving it at all. It also doesn't seem to be driven by agri-business taking over land formerly held by families, or any of the other causes usually cited in other cases. The same goes for parts of South America.
        One guess is that African urbanization is being driven almost totally by non-economic factors, such as fear of mercenary bandit forces invading rural villages. This is a very real risk in some places, but also an incredibly overhyped risk in others where it is geographically unfeasable and not historically seen, yet waves of rumors seem to spring up from nowhere, and people respond to them in states of near panic by moving to the citys even with no prospect of employment or socal services.
          China, and most of Asia, seems to be roughly following the model of the west, where flight to the urban centers is at least sometimes driven by desire to better oneself. However, they also have concurrent pressures the 'first world' didn't. In the US and Europe, we had songs and jokes (How are you gonna keep 'em down on the farm, after they've seen Paris?) ever since the 1910's, while big Agribusiness presures lagged that by 50 years or so. In China, the two are nearly running in sync.

But what about the rest?

[CCFreak2K]

As far as motherboards go (or basically just about any PCB in a home PC), ECS isn't exactly the best, but they also aren't the worst. What about companies like ASUS, or companies at the other side of the spectrum like PCCHIPS? How well do their factories and workers fare against ECS's standards?

Re:But what about the rest?

[evilviper]

ECS isn't exactly the best, but they also aren't the worst. What about companies like ASUS, or companies at the other side of the spectrum like PCCHIPS?

I hate multi-page articles as much as anybody, but damn. In the SECOND SENTENCE it says in no uncertain terms:

After merging with PC Chips, ECS has recently started pushing into the retail market;

And for this, you got modded up. Wonderful.

page 5 shows it well...

[YesIAmAScript]

http://www.hardcoreware.net/reviews/review-335-5.h tm

The surface mount components are installed by machine. Large components cannot be inserted by machine.

ECS is doing the same thing you see a picture of at that other site. They install some stuff by machine, some by hand.

The machines cost about $100,000 (I asked when viewing a line). But they can insert a lot of components the one in the pic is inserting at least 40 different components (you can see from the reels), probably 100+ total SM components in the same time as one of those women inserts their components. So, it replaces 100+ women, the women make $50 a month, two shifts a day. That's replacing $10,000 worth of people a month at chinese wages.

As you can see, they can't afford not to use these machines. And really, if you care about quality at all, you especially can't afford not to use these machines. These machines are far more accurate, so your yield goes way up.

It's true that the wages in China make labor-intensive assembly feasible. But you've picked a bad example of labor-intensive assembly. Any device that is sold with a tight-fitting case on it (like a cell phone) is going to have a lot more manual labor required, because attaching subassemblies, routing flexes and stuffing it in that case can't be done by machine. A motherboard is sold to you bare (not in a case), and thus can be automated a lot more.

BS!

[mangu]

Automated insertion machines put in the components, and transfer conveyors connect the machines. That's the way it should be.

You mean, like this? Do you think these people make less than $1/hour? Do you think this kind of work is done by robots in the USA?

Why don't you try to learn something about a subject before posting? You have no idea of how electronic manufacturing is done, either in China or US or Mexico or anywhere. Placing SMDs is never done by hand, no human being, regardless of salary, can place them with the needed precision in an assembly line. OTOH, there are many types of tests and inspections that need to be done by humans. Current artificial vision systems, for instance, are too unreliable to locate many types of failures that people see at a glance.

This isnt new by a long shot.

[sethstorm]

If you've lived next to and/or worked for a multinational, you have seen this kind of factory buildup - examples being NCR and IBM (to name two random offenders amongst them all) that did the same thing as some have suggested - uproot and move to anywhere else that has the least ethical cost. Both examples had a major US presence, valuing the workers until Reagan and Thatcher reworded "corporate favortism" into "competition". That's when things went to countries such as China (that do nothing but keep themselves artificially cheaper, or have rubber stamped CMM-5's that cost companies more than domestic talent did).

  What you see in China will meet the same fate with even more dire consequences for a population that cannot even question the problem. If there are any benefits at the end for pulling these kind of stunts, I might as well sign up and be frozen for the next 500 years and maybe have a chance at seeing any perceived benefits.

How do you think you get a DVD player for $100?

[Anonymous Coward]

1) kick people out of their homes and off their farms with the help of corrupt government officials and armed gangs - so the land for the factory is cheap. Promise compensation, but don't pay what you promised, or pay it late, or not at all. Bribe the local police to intimidate people who speak out.

2) Build the factory using itinerant workers. Pay as little as possible by using sub contractors who rip off their staff, run off with their wages, fine them for being 5 minutes late for work (never hear about people getting a proportionate bonus for 5 min OVERTIME do you?)

3) Staff factory with the people who lost their homes or businesses when the land was appropriated to build a new factory.

4) Institute demeaning, draconian work practices. Fine workers who turn up late. Offer them Housing and meals, but deduct that from their paypacket (even Nokia's factory was doing this) work them 12 hours a day. Turn the local police (who are now in your back pocket) onto anyone who makes trouble.

etc onward all the way to Walmart or wherever else you get a $100 DVD player. You people buying them (sipping your fairtrade coffee but snuggled up in your made in china Acrylic knitware) are placing yourselves at the end of a long chain of sufferring, exploitation and violence. www.theepochtimes.com and other people are risking their lives to try and inform the public in developed countries.

Don't worry when you're neutered by an exploding MBP battery - finding donors for replacement parts is no problem!

Ah - what the hell's the point? you people do care... but... $100... is just... so... damn... cheap.

Description of process is highly lacking

[dovgr]

The description of the steps of the production of the PCB is highly lacking. Here is a list of technologies used in the production of a motherboard that are not even mentioned in the article:

• Imaging: How the CAM patterns are transfered to the PCB. There are three different methods used in the industry:
  1. Plotter draws on film, conductor is coated with photoresist, pattern is copied from film to photoresist through UV light, photoresist is developed, washed, and the panel is etched.
  2. Direct imaging, which skips the step of using film and writes directly on a special photoresist. Precisition is much higher. Usually not used yet for computer motherboard, but only for high end mobiles.
  3. Build up. Instead of etching the material is deposited by electrolysis on top of the laminate.
• Drilling. Used for interconnections between surface layers of the motherboard. Old method was mechanical. Today the market is using laser drilling almost exclusively.
• AOI - Automatic Optical Inspection. Used at every stage of the production to find faults as soon as possible. It is much much cheaper to find a short on the bare PCB board, which can be repaired, then to find the same defect by a malfunctioning motherboard, which needs to be scrapped. Even the assambled boards are checked with AOI.
• Different chemical processes used for the build-up process.

On the other hand there were pictures from the cafeteria... ;-)