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In Xhengzhou, Thousands Vie For Foxconn Jobs
hypnosec writes "Foxconn is supposedly looking to enhance its workforce in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou and despite the less-than-satisfactory working conditions in the company, thousands of aspirants are lining up for jobs in its factories. Not caring about the harsh working conditions at Foxconn, thousands of people congregated outside a labor office in Zhengzhou, the largest city of Henan province in North central China, impatiently waiting for a chance to work at Foxconn. Foxconn, which is engaged in assembling iPhones and iPads for Apple, is planning to hire an additional 100000 employees as it is aiming at augmenting its iPhone production."
I don't get the exclusive association between Apple and Foxconn presented by the tech press. Foxconn is the world's largest electronics manufacturer and makes products for Dell, Sony, Motorola, Nintendo, Nokia, Microsoft, HP, and pretty much every other major computer-related company. The fact they're the largest also means that there really isn't much of an option for companies like Dell or Apple to stop using Foxconn, because nobody else can assemble products at the volume required.
The Foxconn suicides that originally drew so much media attention were the result of several external factors including several labor strikes and poor economic conditions throughout China in 2010. The working conditions are actually comparatively good for Chinese factories, and the suicide rate is less than that of the general population, but the idea of an industry darling like Apple using "slave labor" to make its products was a narrative too juicy for the media to ignore.
Though investigations did find overtime and other managerial abuses by Foxconn (making them not unlike Walmart), it's amusing to see thousands lining up to work there in contradiction to the extremely negative portrayal by the Western media such as that offered by the first linked article in the summary.
According to Reuters, Apple surpassed Android in marketshare by the end of 2011, confirming earlier reports by both Nielsen and NPD. 150 Android smartphones couldn't beat the iPhone 4S. With 15 million iPads sold last quarter, the tablet market is now larger than the entire desktop PC market. Apple’s profits ($13 billion) exceeded Google’s entire revenue ($10.6 billion).
Who cares? Well, in January 2011, Slashdot triumphantly reported that Android surpassed iOS in marketshare. All year, Android fans cited Android's marketshare as proof that it was taking over the smartphone industry, that the lack of centralized control was superior to the "walled garden", and that Android was "winning".
So what happened when the opposite occurred and Apple reversed Android's marketshare lead by the end of the year? Despite multiple submissions from several users, and news coverage ranging from Arstechnica to CNN, Slashdot refused to publish the story. All the sudden, it wasn't considered newsworthy despite the publication of the other story a year earlier.
This is a Linux advocacy site whose initial userbase was driven by hatred of Windows marketshare. Marketshare is still highly fetishized around here. Anything negative about the marketshare of Linux, or platforms based on Linux, gets killed. Slashdot is intentionally not providing you full tech news coverage because it caters to a specific demographic of emotionally-invested users who are more likely to generate repeat page views.
Lemmings queue for choice spaces at the precipice.
I wish them luck.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
"Less than satisfactory" according to white, paternalistic Americans who frequent Whole Foods.
Sorry to stereotype here, but let the Chinese figure out what is satisfactory or not.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
That's good news! With that number, they will probably be able to afford a communal iPhone.
This used to be common in America too. Young people would line up around the block to work in slaughterhouses, textile mills, etc. They, being young, thought themselves invincible. They thought they could handle whatever was thrown at them, and work their way out of poverty. They were wrong.
They'd be used up, and thrown away like chaff, and a new batch of starry-eyed youngsters would be brought in.
As long as workers are disorganized, businesses will play them against each other, and the workers will suffer for it.
of course you're going to want the entire saltine.
The Daily Show had a recent segment on a Foxconn superfactory in China.
Disclaimer: I'd like to link to the actual dailyshow website instead of a pirated youtube clip. But as a Canadian, and because of archaic television distribution rights, I can't access their website.
I first want to make clear that I am not "defending" Foxconn by any means. They definitely have room for improvement, as does every other company. But to say that working conditions at Foxconn are "less-than-satisfactory" and "harsh" is clearly biased.
Relative to most other manufacturing companies in China, Foxconn is actually one of the companies that treats is employees well in that they pay their employees on time, pay overtime when it is due, and provide perks for many of their workers (including rent-free accommodations, meals, entertainment, etc.). Because of that, Foxconn is actually a desirable place to work in China considering the alternatives. Foxconn is providing an opportunity to make a livable wage for millions of people in China.
Again, I am not defending Foxconn, but it really irks me to see people here blast Foxconn for poor working conditions when the vast majority of them have never been to Asia. Is there room for improvement? Absolutely. But I really wish people would be more objective in their assessments of the situation.
In Xhengzhou, Thousands Vie For Foxconn Jobs
I know the keys are right next to each other on the keyboard, but "Xhengzhou" is simply not possible in the Chinese spelling system. You got it right in the summary (Zhengzhou), but the headline is just nutty.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, you're not using enough of it. --AC
Yeah, they're dying to get them.
When someone says, "Any fool can see
Plantation slavery was not much different from the way these workers live in their dormitories. I would hazard a guess that slave owners actually generally cared about their slaves significantly more than Apple and FoxConn care about these workers. In fact, the very fact that workers aren't even allowed to socialize in their dormitories suggests to me that on balance, plantation slaves might have actually had more freedom since they were free to form families (who admittedly could be sold like slaves), socialize and often free to work for money once their field work was done.
I say this not to defend plantation slavery as anything objectively good, but to note the irony that someone who defends FoxConn's treatment of workers while holding views antagonistic toward actual plantation slavery is being very hypocritical because on balance, these workers have it even worse. I'm white and if I had to choose between being a field slave in the South vs working under the conditions the FoxConn workers do with the sort of future that awaits them, hands down I'd choose to be a slave. At least then the master's tyranny would end at sun down.
Can you imagine the impace that many jobs would have on a local community in the US?
I realize these jobs will never come back to the US, but sigh. I long for the days before the decline of Western Civilization.
The increasingly number of stories on the poor working conditions in China are frustrating, because they are so dense. It would be much more honest to compare Foxconn to other Chinese factories, rather than to the practically-no-longer-existing factories in the Western world. It would make for a less exciting story - and probably also a less dualistic one: I'm afraid if the discourse is not framed in terms of bad villains (Foxconn and Apple) leagued to exploit the poor good guys (the defenseless Chinese peasants), it is less easy to stimulate discussion. But this is all stuff that cleverer people have said before me, why do we keep rehashing it?
When people are starving to death, living in areas so polluted by heavy metals that the chinese govt denies the who access to take soil samples, and where there is such a sickeningly huge divide between wealthy and poor, it should come as no surprise that people will rush from dieing of hunger and poisoning to dieing of overwork and poisoning.
The implied "look, thousands line up for these slave labor positons, so they can't be as bad as everyone says! So, its OK to buy chinese made things!" Is so morally destitute and wrong it defies reason.
Newsflash fuckers. Just because people are lining up to try to crawl their way out of the chinese agricultural infrastructure where they live in straw huts and lack basic sanitation, doesn't make the hellholes they are scambling to get to any less hellish.
bonch is a shill account employed to astroturf for apple. It is used together with other shill accounts such as SharkLaser and Overly Critical Guy, to manipulate slashdot users with pro-Apple, anti-Google PR.
I'm reminded of a recent Slashdot article that had an interesting passage to me:
Apple executives say that going overseas, at this point, is their only option. One former executive described how the company relied upon a Chinese factory to revamp iPhone manufacturing just weeks before the device was due on shelves. Apple had redesigned the iPhone’s screen at the last minute, forcing an assembly line overhaul. New screens began arriving at the plant near midnight.
A foreman immediately roused 8,000 workers inside the company’s dormitories, according to the executive. Each employee was given a biscuit and a cup of tea, guided to a workstation and within half an hour started a 12-hour shift fitting glass screens into beveled frames. Within 96 hours, the plant was producing over 10,000 iPhones a day.
“The speed and flexibility is breathtaking,” the executive said. “There’s no American plant that can match that.”
This raised many questions in my mind. Like whether or not other Chinese companies would respond with such force to a request? Is it just because Apple is so big that Foxconn takes these extreme measures? Are Foxconn employees experiencing longer shifts because of these pressures from Apple and, ultimately, Apple consumers?
... but at what future and permanent and irreversible cost?
You're also missing a point that I found interesting from the This American Life episode on these plants. One group had gone to a village that did not have a Foxconn plant but was due to get one. They looked at the village and the quality of life of the people. It wasn't pretty. After the plant opened, after people got the jobs and after electricity and running water were forcefully brought for the purpose of the plant, life improved. Sure, pollution got worse but the group couldn't argue with people being better fed, having electricity and (more) potable water. Is this a good argument for Foxconn and Apple? I don't think so but it's an ethics issue and I think you'll find a lot of people are divided on this issue.
Closer to home for me, people from West Virginia have been attacking the EPA for stopping mountaintop mining in their state. They say that the EPA is halting job creation and go on and on about how horrible the EPA is. It's so odd to me because this state is rife with environmental problems left over from just this mining and when there was no EPA and no regulations on the state level, chemical companies ran rampant in West Virginia. I wouldn't drink the groundwater there if my life depended on it now. And what was the reason for this? To give a few generations of jobs and stoke the smokestacks of the industrial USA? Sure
My work here is dung.
When is the last time anyone heard that phrase in the U.S.?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
They charge "Made in the US" prices but use Chinese labour. No surprise that draws some attention. Also they seem to want to deflect attention from it. On their boxes they say really prominently "Designed by Apple in California". On the device where there's the required "made in" sticker they prefix it with "Designed by Apple in California".
One summer when I was 15, I worked on a farm/ranch in western Nebraska. I worked twelve-hour days six days a week harvesting hay, helping out with dehorning/deballing of steers (not a fun task!), and general farm maintenance activities. Only day off was on Sundays. It was a hot, hard, smelly job. I personally enjoyed it (I treated it like an extended Boy Scout Summer Camp that I got paid for), but the bulk of the other teens out there complained and found it far too hard for them.
If you compare the general conditions of the Foxconn factories to the working conditions in the rural countryside, I would be willing to bet that it's far better to be a Foxconn employee than a farm worker (or other such rural worker). And honestly, if you don't have a job in China (for all their vaunted "Socialist" (socialist in name only, IMHO)) it's better than starving. It probably does amount to slavery, unfortunately.
When is the last time anyone heard that phrase in the U.S.?
If Americans would be productive doing repetitive tasks for 75 cents an hour, I bet you would hear it everyday.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/business/global/08wages.html
Endorsed by corporations everywhere in the name of "globalization".
As Sinclair noted, the reason that people then demanded change in Chicago meat packing wasn't the treatment of the workforce; it was their fear that they would die of eating infected meat. No such risk with iPhones, so there is no way of limiting the exploitation.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
And are you old enough to know what slavery means?
Are you also Chinese? And have you lived in China long enough to know what oppression means in China?
No?
Then how in the world can you even begin to compare these two forms of oppression?
I do believe you've managed to insult two different ethnic groups at the same time.
As numerous as Foxcon's flaws are, they pale in comparison to the more numerous non-name contractors. The non-names break many more labor laws, pollution and safety regulations, and stiff wages. They bribe or have connections with the petty bureaucrats. They've been known to pack up machines on off-day Sunday and disappear leaving workers unpaid and unemployed. Everyone knows this is going on and make movies and write books about it. I've seen several. The workers know this a crave the established contractors. A new farm boy will do a couple stints at a no name and they qualify for a Foxcon. It takes time for the legal system and societal expectations to take firm root.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"Zhengzhou" not "Xhengzhou"
$ echo "ceci n'est pas une pipe" | sed -Ee 's/(eci n|pas )//g'
Most people where happy about the "leveling of the playing field" aspects of recent improvements in communication, technology, and travel. I can remember people talking in the late-90's about how the internet was going to make the world a better place, now that all the smaller countries could participate on the same terms as the first-world big guys. But all I could feel at the time was sad (selfishly so, admittedly). Because, unlike most of the cheerleaders, it occured to me that a level playing field was great news for poor countries--but really BAD news for the rich countries. If you're making $1 a day, the chance to make 75 cents an hour is a godsend. If you're making $15+/hr. though, this means you're about to be out of work.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
You are so very wrong. Try reading “Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Slavery” by Fogel.
Slavery apologist tried making the same type of argument - that their slaves received better care (food, clothing, care in old age, etc.) then their northern “wage salve” counterparts – which might be true.
However, the wage slave could vote with their feet – they were not required to work. The wage slave could hope for a better life for their children by investing in their future – something slaves were prevented from doing.
To cost to freedom for true plantation slavery was horrendous as accounted in economic terms – to say nothing of moral ones.
If I can't get hired at Foxconn I guess I'll have to go work at Soylent.
there really isn't much of an option for companies like Dell or Apple to stop using Foxconn, because nobody else can assemble products at the volume required.
Are you brainwashed, a brainwasher, or brainless?
What you say is complete utter bullshit. It's about lowest cost of manufacturing in a land that does almost nothing to protect its people from harsh working conditions, exploitation, pollution and so on.
It is done in order to maximize PROFIT to the corporations, PERIOD.
This could be done by dozens of companies in dozens of countries where people are treated like actual human beings rather than meat-based disposable robots.
It would just cost more for your shiny little disposable toys and you'd get two cents a share less on your Apple stock. God forbid!
To quote "Business Insider" magazine:
Apple doesn't build iPhones in the United States, in other words, because there is no longer an ecosystem here to support that manufacturing. There's no supply chain, there aren't enough super-low-cost workers, and there are not enough mid-level engineers.
The real reasons Apple makes iPhones in China, therefore, are as follows:
- Most of the components of iPhones and iPads--the supply chain--are now manufactured in China, so assembling the phones half-a-world away would create huge logistical challenges. It would also reduce flexibility--the ability to switch easily from one component supplier or manufacturer to another.
- China's factories are now far bigger and more nimble than those in the United States. They can hire (and fire) tens of thousands of workers practically overnight. Because so many of the workers live on-site, they can also press them into service at a moment's notice. And they can change production practices and speeds extremely rapidly.
- China now has a far bigger supply of appropriately-qualified engineers than the U.S. does--folks with the technical skills necessary to build complex gadgets but not so credentialed that they cost too much.
And, lastly, China's workforce is much hungrier and more frugal than many of their counterparts in the United States.
Ever heard of Samsung TVs? DVD players? Monitors? That's right, Samsung makes a whole lot more SHITLOAD of stuff than Apple In fact there are tons of other companies that make more thing than Apple. Obscure companies that have not well known names like Sony, LG, etc. You might not of heard of them, since they are not well known.
Maybe YOU would like to reconsider?
Charge less, got it.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
I hear that phrase all the time, I don't know what you're talking about.
Oh, what's that you say? "Hire" with an "h"? Nevermind then...
That is just silly. The vast majority of these agrarian workers left still-existing farms of their own volition. The farms are still there, and they aren't "displaced" by growing cities. These farms are hundreds if not thousands of miles away from major cities. They just don't want to go back to a lifestyle indistinguishable from the time Samurai walked the earth.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
Given the terrible shape of the U.S. economy, this may be a picture into our future. People will be desperate to work for ANYTHING.
$2B for the quarter! Sony earnings announcement.
Or the LG that loses money on handsets?
Samsung does "better" - it made 1/3 of what Apple made last quarter.
Last time I checked, corporations are investment vehicles, not jobs programs, or "making lots of things" programs.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
Is the issue Foxconn or is it China, with its corrupt government?
Are you willing to pay 2-3 times as much for the same product?
Most of the people hating on Apple for this wouldn't buy an Apple product if it were the only defibrillator that could keep them alive, at any price. So don't expect a good faith answer on that. They are just the type of "open garden" crowd hoping and waiting for Apple to stumble, i.e., haters. If you want proof, just watch how this post is moderated.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
I am, and if you're not, it isn't "your" company.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
And in English it means "to strive in competition or rivalry with another." Man, people here complain even when words are used correctly...
In America, we'd call that an antitrust violation. Be careful how you throw that word "freedom" around.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
Maybe because the conditions at FoxConn, while shitty by our standards, are actually pretty fucking sweet if you're a rural Chinese worker?
But yeah, we don't want to hear that. We want to hear about how horrible Apple is.
Conditions at Foxconn may not be good by our standards, but they're a hell of a lot better than at most Chinese factories, especially those manufacturing goods for the Chinese domestic market.
I'm confused: what do most people in China do for a living? I'm sure that factory worker is a large segment but does it really employ that many people?
Why are these near slavery factory jobs attractive to them? You might say "because they are better than other factory jobs", however, what would these people do if there were no factory jobs? What do all of these people who are in line there do now? Are they wandering starving homeless people or? They must be unemployed, but who supports them? Do they live with their parents on a subsistence farm or something like that?
I'm trying to get an idea of what these people lining up are like and what their options are in life that these factory conditions so desirable.
As a follow up: many people in the late 1800s in the US took factory jobs because they thought it would be better than subsistence farming. Is that the case here? While I'm not a subsistence farmer, it seems like a much better life than a slave-like factory worker. Perhaps you are more hungry but I would think you are less stressed and free. I would appreciate if someone could shed some light on this.
A few decades ago, the prevailing sentiments were that Japan had a rather elevated suicide rate.
We're suppose to assume that the Japanese have made a startling turnaround.
Since the Chinese copy everything (so did the the Japanese at one time actually), I'm sure their suicide rates will likewise decrease as they become more westernized like Japan did.
And safety is not high on the list of things there even more so when it's cheaper to get new workers then to make the place safer. Also long working hours lead to more accidents.
I am just waiting for the McDonalds, Wallmart, Apple war to begin. I am not sure what will start the hostilities, but I know there can only be one!
It's comments like your that make me sad at the decline of society. There is nothing wrong with a company that can mobilize 8k people at the drop of a hat, 24x7 - company with on-call staff (which I have been before) can call them up any time, why is that not just as evil? Or what about the military where not only might you be waking up at 3m but you might be flying out in 10 minutes to nowherestan to set up camp under fire?
The fact is, there's nothing inherently wrong with setting up an organization that can react instantly to demand and humans as a species deserve praise for being able to make this happen.
Your infantile painting of this as some kind of problem shows that some people are just ready to go back to living in caves - well count me out, civilization overall has done a lot more good than harm and I'll not go backwards to satisfy your uninformed sense of morality.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
No, it's "okay" because the Chinese people are better with Foxconn than without it, and they're better off if you buy from Foxconn than if you don't.
That is the standard argument that people use to rationalize buying stuff made with slave or child labor or by workers in similarly horrific working conditions. Frankly, it doesn't hold water.
You're creating a straw man when you say "If they didn't work for Foxconn, they would have no jobs at all". The alternatives aren't "Work long days for 29 cents an hour" and "Don't have a job at all". There is also the option of "Work a bit shorter days for 50 cents an hour". We as consumers can demand companies to demand their subcontractors to offer workers somewhat tolerable working conditions.
At this point right wing idealists tend to say "If wages go up, prices go up, less products are sold, less workers are hired, growth is stiffled and people end up worse off". It's hard to claim that this would apply here: How many manhours per smartphone are spent in Foxconn factories? If the cost of workforce would go up by 15 cents per manhour, the price increase of endproduct wouldn't significantly alter the demand.
So no, we don't suddenly become dicks if we tell companies "We are willing to accept 2 dollars of price increase in our smartphones but we won't buy your products unless you tell Foxconn - or any other subcontractor you choose - to provide reasonable working conditions".
No, that would be the wrong conclusion.
The salary difference amounts to a meager $65 per iPhone if that was all it took. Cheap workers are not the key.
The real difference is infrastructure and scale.
The article goes on to describe that the American labor market is simply not able to supply the needed amount of correctly trained workers regardless. You would need to train a whole new generation! An impossible task and very costly [investment].
That race is probably lost, at least for now, what people should focus on is innovation and highly skilled jobs.
Remember, the people working the assembly lines do very simple tasks, never mind those workers, the problem is the thousands of skilled engineers that monitor and control these employees. At least according to the article, that's the second biggest hurdle.
Your conclusion is wrong in my opinion.
Also, will you please understand that I quoted a magazine! I assume they have greater insight in to this area than you and I. They actually have people in China that understand manufacturing.
Foxconn is building in Brazil as you correctly stated because it's one of the world's fastest growing markets, but also because they have huge import taxes on electronics. Apple has very little market share in Brazil, and they want to "cover" the BRIC countries as well as expand their world wide manufacturing capacity.
The rising wages in China are not a problem as you incorrectly assume, they are not moving factories from China to other cheaper countries.
They're creating new factories in other more expensive Asian countries, such as Malaysia, to supply the world market. They expect the salaries to increase in China even further! The Chinese factories will focus ever more on the Chinese domestic market. A market with ever greater importance and much larger and stronger demand than the global market.
I'm sorry, but again you seem to miss the point and jump to unwarranted conclusions. It's not the salary that's keeping Apple and everyone else in China!
If you could create the same infrastructure and scale for manufacturing in the US, they estimate the additional cost for each iPhone would be an additional $1,000 per phone!
Warehousing and keeping stock is extremely expensive, it's all done Just-In-Time now.
In some way you could say that, but that is the nature of the capitalist economic system. Corporations are not charities. They have a responsibility to their shareholders, not the citizens of said country!
In my opinion the Chinese did not simply "force" their population, they're not slaves as you claim. They're highly skilled and educated. That's an advantage the US economy doesn't enjoy. There are plenty of smart, skilled and highly educated Americans, but there are so few of them by comparison with China. The US lower working class and urban poor are not "material" for high tech manufacturing jobs. To put it bluntly; the US has become fat and complancent.
If you wanted to re-establish manufacturing in the US you would need to start from scratch. In my opinion you would have to tear down the welfare state, take away civil rights and laws that stand in the way. Possibly huge government lead infrastructure projects, it wouldn't be "cost effective" for corporations. You would be asking for a European social-democratic state. The whole American ethos would become utterly meaningless.
But you got to stand up and take a break every so often.
That's bullshit. As one of Foxconn's biggest customers, if not its biggest, Apple has a very big lever with which to affect the working conditions of Foxconn workers. And Apple could always decide to make those parts at a plant where the workers are treated as human beings.
And Apple's statement of "supplier responsibility" has been nothing but lip service because they know their target US audience probably wouldn't be happy knowing that they are supporting slavery.
You are welcome on my lawn.
People should read this which is written nobody but Paul Krugman himself, the intellectual leader of left-wing. Some of these economic fallacies are repeated here like fifteen times. It is like going to mainstream news and saying downloading is stealing. Sure, there're efficiency issues here but 5 second hunch isn't an educated opinion.
Moralizing about these factories is maybe signalling caring to others but it isn't helping. Increasing labor regulation is probably worst thing you could do. They have actually done some of that in Bangladesh, and people ended up in their next best alternative: dead due to lack of food or prostitution. Good intentions don't mean good results.
People who say we shouldn't buy these chinese products could do the worst damage. Living standards don't rise because of regulation, more than Moon orbits Earth because of law makers. The only reason is that all these commentators can get away with this cheap talk, is that they nothing on the line. If you actually had money on the line how to rise people's living standards, you would maybe pick up an economics textbook, or *gasp* remain silent.
Because in the world I live in, Apple prices are quite a bit higher. For example a 15" quad core MacBook runs me $1800. Dell will sell me a 15" XPS with a quad core, twice the RAM, twice the disk, and better graphics for $1300. I don't know about you but $500 for less system is expensive to me. For the extra they charge, I'm betting US manufacturing would be possible.
Yes, you implied that work is scarce in China. Which it is not. Good jobs are scarce. And in China, a Foxconn factory position _is a good job_.
What you mean to say is "other jobs are worse".
This does not make it a good job. To properly godwin this thread, Stalin was better then Hitler, but that does not make Soviet Russia a good place to live.
I take it you're a nice, comfortable American who's never really ventured outside their own country. You have a nice house, multiple cars, all your idevices so forth and so on. You dont really need for much do you.
This is not the case in China, The average Chinese person doesn't have multiple cars, they dont even have a car, they'd be lucky to have an old motorbike. A lot of villages dont even have 24 hour power in their homes. This is where your Foxconn workers come from. They have the choice between being a farmer or being a factory worker and the factory worker is not a subsistence job (I.E. it pays). Now the Chinese worker can buy things, namely things for their family being no old age pension in China and it's hard to save up a retirement fund when you have been a subsistence farmer all your life.
So stop deluding yourself that a factory job is a good job, it's a job that pays better then their other options. Being better by default does not make it good.
Now that I've made that point, The reason that people are lining up for Foxconn jobs is because they went back to their ville's and families for Chinese New Year. They dont get paid annual leave in China, so in order to do this they quit before Chinese New Year and now come back and get another job after CNY. So the article is a complete and fallacious troll and a belated Gong Xi to Parent.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Can someone please change the headline from "In Xhengzhou, Thousands Vie For Foxconn Jobs" to "In Zhengzhou, Thousands Vie For Foxconn Jobs".
The name of the Chinese city in question is Zhengzhou not Xhengzhou.
A dream is good. A plan is better.
that those numbers are mostly cooked. Sony uses hollywood accounting tactics, LG likely does the same. And also that engaget is pure marketing, designed to get you to buy into more things you don't need.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
You'd rather that other people's lives are harmed so you can afford your bloody throwaway toy of the week?
Look up the word psychopath in the dictionary.
As this excellent piece by Thomas Friedman points out, manufacturing is rapidly becoming a global commodity. The real value resides with the creators of a product, the designers, engineers, marketers, etc. Factories are just big machines into which you plug your designs, and they can be swapped in and out of your logistics chains if necessary.
The "big machine" analogy is even more apt as manufacturing eventually shifts more and more to automation. How many workers does a robotic factory need? If you've ever seen videos of the Lego factory in Denmark, the answer could be as few as none, and it operates 24/7, 364 days a year (down one day for maintenance). Jobs was right to tell Obama that manufacturing jobs aren't coming back to the U.S.
Apple is merely acknowledging the fact that the "Designed in" sticker is coming to mean a hell of a lot more than the "Made in" sticker.
You do realise that some of those ~308 million are children, OAPs, invalids and of course the 1% and therefore don't figure into unemployment stats?
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
Uh?
You think a 30% price increase could be enough, when labor is at least an order of magnitude more expensive?
As a Scandinavian, happily living in a social-democratic state, with little evidence of your so called "facist" entity, I strongly disagree with your description of the past, present and future, "my little friend".
In case you didn't notice, my comment included the American ethos ("The American Dream") simply to underline the fact that this is what most Americans want despite the very low probability that they will ever make it from gardener to billionaire. Why would you want to give that up? (sarcasm)
The EU is in no way similar to the corporatist US, you seem to have very little knowledge of the EU's relationship with its member countries, corporations and citizens. Never mind the actual record, the EU's parliament and officers have shown very strong support for its citizens's rights during the last decade for example in Internet privacy and so on. The US on the other hand has removed ever more of its citizens' rights including the Patriot Act, DMCA, ACTA and so on.
No, the EU is not ruled by corporations, just ask Microsoft, convicted in the US for monopolistic practices, just not punished for it... In the EU on the other hand.
No, like most people reading the article I quoted you seem to dismiss the third element mentioned. Even if the US created the supply chain, infrastructure and provided [adequate]low-cost factory workers, the US still would not be able to provide the huge number of engineers needed.
The US education system is not able to create the correct amount or type of workers. Never mind that this industry demands greater flexibility than most Western employees would accept. I don't know what the situation is in Brazil, I assume they are able to supply the factories. I believe they are going to offer training.
Even if you could somehow make Apple and everyone else produce in the US, it would hurt the corporations greatly because of the lost ability to move fast, keep low inventory and rapidly source from other suppliers. That could potentially destroy their current position(s) in the market.
That domestic demand doesn't need any development any longer. It's much stronger in all areas, from cars to luxury items. The monied class in China is filled with countless billionaries (in US Dollars).
The shortage is geographically limited to the coastal region where most production happens today. Why do you think Foxconn just created their massive super factories further inland? This is just the natural next move.
That's hardly an accurate description from what I read, the Chinese unions strength is miniscule as they're limited and/or controlled by Beijing. They seem to be changing, not so much "growing". It has had an effect in companies from Honda to Foxconn, but it is not similar to how Western or American unions function, this short article is enlightening:
http://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/CP204.pdf
Yes, they are also moving to more expensive Asian countries such as Malaysia because they foresee rising wages in China.
The Chinese factories are already being refocused to supply the domestic market, while other Asian factories will supply the world market. The Chinese domestic market is growing much faster and unlike the West has stable, high growth.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_21/b4179011091633.htm
and of course it says "Designed by Apple in California", because it was. It also says, "Made in China", which is also true.
are you annoyed that Apple is being too honest on their products?
I don't get what all the fuss is about. I work as web developer for 400$ a month, 8 hours shift, 350$ rent, min. 200$ food (bread ~1.8$), min. 100$ energy bills (electricity, water, heating etc...) and no overtime fee. End of month = -250$ (with me only working, eating, drinking, pissing and 2nd one..) which makes me work another 6 hours a day (effectively 14hours shift) ...
"Foxconn city" employee (not to be confused with Han Hoi) works as mid level engeneer for 500$ a month, 12 hours shifts, no rent, warm meals, no energy bills, paid overtime.
Rnd of month = 500$...
So I live in Europe (Croatia), work more then a Chinese, ern less money then him and am still short at the end of the month, and he is the poor one? yeah right...
P.S. Suicide rate in town I live in is ~5/year...