Behind the Scenes With Samsung's Factory Workers

itwbennett writes "The young women working at Samsung's factory in Tianjin, China like their jobs about as much as factory workers anywhere. The work is boring and tiring, but it pays ok and there are perks (like air conditioning in the dorms), says 19-year-old Zhao Caixia. One 23-year-old woman, who assembles 200-300 camera lenses a day, told the IDG News Service's Michael Kan: 'You just keep doing the same thing over and over. There is nothing really to like, but nothing to really dislike either.' Labor rights group China Labor Watch tells a different story (PDF). One day after Samsung said it would audit its suppliers in China, the group reported cases of excessive overtime (exceeding 100 hours per month) and exhausting working conditions, with employees being made to stand for up to 12 hours for a single shift."

Comments

Re:frist

[the_Bionic_lemming]

YAY -I Actually shot something!

I might be out of scope here

[dyingtolive]

But I'm pretty sure that when I lived in crapsack podunk land as a teenager, I had stood for 12 hours in a single shift working at the shithole state fair cleaning barns for not much more than minimum wage.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Osgeld]

even in my company 12 hour shifts are common, in the hearland of the USA ... boo who for the Asians?

Re:I might be out of scope here

[formfeed]

even in my company 12 hour shifts are common, in the hearland of the USA ... boo who for the Asians?

At least you had the chance to vote for politicians that kill unions, defund OSHA, and turn the US into a third world country.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[hawguy]

even in my company 12 hour shifts are common, in the hearland of the USA ... boo who for the Asians?

I worked construction for a few summers after high school -- 12 hour shifts weren't uncommon (on my feet the whole time), and I took all the overtime I could get, sometimes putting in 80 hours or more of overtime a month (six 10 hour days/week), If I didn't have to drive up to 90 minutes each way to the job site on the other side of the state, I probably would have put in more overtime. When I was lucky, I'd get to drive an escort vehicle for a wide-load truck on my way to or from the job site so I'd rack up a couple hours of work while driving to work).

It was hard work, but I still found time to party with friends on the weekends, and the work paid most of my first two years of college.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[dyingtolive]

My work experience now is somewhat different. For being with a company where I directly support stock market traders, the atmosphere is entirely laid back. I'm salaried, but if I work more than eight hours a day (which is usually out of personal interest in what I'm doing) I typically have my boss or someone nagging me to go home. I actually spend some time working on an urgent issue over a weekend a couple weeks ago of my own volition, and when I told my boss that Monday, he became really concerned that I had to put in some extra time (i.e. what broke and is it still broke), and then told me to feel free to take off however much I needed to make it back up to myself. I found out later I got put in for some "above and beyond" recognition thing for giving enough of a damn to make sure that stuff isn't falling apart around me.

We all talk doom and gloom, but at the end of the day, it's really not completely impossible to find a company that will actually hesitate before immediately and always treating their workers like shit. Of course, having that been said, I've had completely opposite experiences at other (and much shorter lived) jobs.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Electricity Likes Me]

even in my company 12 hour shifts are common, in the hearland of the USA ... boo who for the Asians?

I worked construction for a few summers after high school -- 12 hour shifts weren't uncommon (on my feet the whole time), and I took all the overtime I could get, sometimes putting in 80 hours or more of overtime a month (six 10 hour days/week), If I didn't have to drive up to 90 minutes each way to the job site on the other side of the state, I probably would have put in more overtime. When I was lucky, I'd get to drive an escort vehicle for a wide-load truck on my way to or from the job site so I'd rack up a couple hours of work while driving to work).

It was hard work, but I still found time to party with friends on the weekends, and the work paid most of my first two years of college.

Two things: (1) this was more or less your choice, and you were rewarded for it with bonus pay to boot. Even if your employer had made it clear at certain times they needed everyone to put in some overtime, you would've had to be paid for it at least.

(2) you were in high school. You can do a lot of really over the top physical feats while in high school, and it's easy. It's a very different thing to being a whole career, and different again to the sort of advancement opportunities you had.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[TemperedAlchemist]

Sure it's that, but you're doing the same five second repetitive job over and over and over for twelve hours straight. While standing.

Sound lame already?

Kay, now envision yourself in that job for 65 - 70 hours a week. You earn $125 per week with all of that overtime. Seem illegal? It is, the maximum amount of overtime per month is 36 hours. But never-mind knowing what your contract says or trying to fight this, you never got a contract. And boy does your boss breath down your neck, and he gets real personal with insults too, calling you a lazy fat slacker and says he hopes you hurt yourself. Want to complain to his boss? Can't, there's no way of putting in complaints.

And what if you do hurt yourself, you have medical insurance that you've been paying like $100 for. Except you don't have your medical insurance card, they never gave you one.

---

Humans really haven't seem to evolved much past slavery, since business owners are trying the best they can to get as close as they can. And sure, everyone and their brother says slavery is wicked and evil, even those crooked business owners. But if you were to allow slavery, you would be surprised at the number of people that would turn back on their words.

I simply must say, capitalism really does bring out the worst in people.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[drhank1980]

I work in the USA for a company that makes chips for Samsung amongst others. Our normal shift is 12 hours on your feet in the fab. (on a compressed schedule, 4 days on 3 days off and then 3 days on and 4 days off, and yes I know China is doing 6/7 days a week as the norm but I also know the quality can/will suffer as we are still cheaper than our outsourced competition for their lack of quality and consistency on a cost per good die metric). Its great money for those of us who work it and many of us sign up for overtime on our days off.

Also more to the point of the article, if you are doing inspections for 12 hours in a row on anything complex, you will suck as an inspector and I would hope Samsung would not accept this as a practice in China (or anywhere for that matter) for the interest of QA for their products but maybe I am asking too much.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[hawguy]

Two things: (1) this was more or less your choice, and you were rewarded for it with bonus pay to boot. Even if your employer had made it clear at certain times they needed everyone to put in some overtime, you would've had to be paid for it at least.

It was my choice in that if I didn't work there, I would have had a minimum wage job at McDonalds - with overtime hours at the construction job, I ended up getting paid over 5 times more than I would have made at McDonalds.

So, I had a choice, but the other choice was less desirable. Sort of a like a chinese factory worker deciding between a hard life on the farm or a hard life (but more comfortable) in the factory.

(2) you were in high school. You can do a lot of really over the top physical feats while in high school, and it's easy. It's a very different thing to being a whole career, and different again to the sort of advancement opportunities you had.

I was 18 - 20 when I worked that job - not much different in age than the 19 and 23 year olds quoted in the summary.

If someone chooses building camera lenses on an assembly line as a career, there's more than Samsung to blame.

I'm not saying that working conditions in China are cushy, but saying that 12 hours/day and 25 hours of overtime/week is worker abuse ignores the fact that there are a lot of people in "developed" countries that work those same hours. If they are not getting compensated for that work, have unsafe conditions, don't have adequate breaks, etc, then that's different, but long hours don't automatically equate to worker abuse.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[jago25_98]

I've done a few jobs not far off this too. I lasted 8 weeks which was longer than the 22 people before me who left before first break. I guess the difference is that there are whole cities like this over there.

when I left and got a better job I realised I could have held out for a better job and/or used benefit or family resources to invest in training. such was my single mindedness in always wanting to be employed I never thought to exercise this possibility.

I wonder if these people are as stuck in a rut as I was, seemingly unable to climb out of the situation without funds and options. or whether there are other possibilities such as selling on eBay

Re:I might be out of scope here

[AmiMoJo]

sometimes putting in 80 hours or more of overtime a month (six 10 hour days/week)

It's understandable your brain would be a bit fried after that.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

> they are not getting compensated for that work, have unsafe conditions, don't have adequate breaks, etc, then that's different, but long hours don't automatically equate to worker abuse.

Actually - it does, to the extend where even in some developing countries (like mine) there is a law that can send managers to jail if they ALLOW a worker to do more than 40 hours overtime a week.
The legal reasoning is pretty sound - anybody who is working that much overtime (even with the required 1.5X pay) is either under duress or is harming himself (and more importantly harming and risking the lives of others) to an unacceptable degree. I the idea that anybody who has worked a 16 hour day is safe to drive home is just outright ludicrous. Preventing that is no more an infringement of liberty than to say you can't drive drunk.

Either way - yes, it IS worker abuse. The fact that this worker abuse happens in developing nations as well just proves that the problem is wide-spread it doesn't mean it's not a problem.

I notice a common thread here - everyone of these "I used to work 12-hour days too" posts have something in common: they all did it when their career choices were limited.
In my view the idea that it was "just how I got my success when I started out" is stupid. That's trying to feel good about not standing up for yourself back then.
No - the difference is - if your boss tried to demand that now, you would probably tell him to shove his job since you've got the qualifications and education to get another one (which will probably pay MORE than what you are earning now). Back then you didn't - and somebody exploited your lack of options.

The 40 hour work-week wasn't just made up. It began with ath 1895 May Day riots in New York, which would subsequently lead to the yearly celebration of worker's day internationally. Those strikes and riots were specifically about getting the 40-hour work-week. The people who led the organisation got framed for murder (which they were subsequently proven absolutely innocent off) - and received summary executions (back then the USA did that).
Good people died so you could have the right to demand extra pay for overtime, they died so you could refuse it, they died so you could see your family at night, so you could get a night's rest, so you could have a social life and not JUST a work life.
I think it's important that their death not be in vain because you take pride in your work. Taking pride in your work is fine, it's nobel, but so is damn well insisting that you will go home at the end of the day.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[TheRaven64]

What's wrong there? 80 hours a month is about 20 hours a week. With a 40 hour normal working week, that means 60 hours including his overtime. Six days of 10 hours a day is 60 hours a week.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[outsider007]

Ah yes, Foxconn's solution of nets to prevent suicide jumping really showed concern for their employees.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[0100010001010011]

My girlfriend is a doctor in her residency. By time you do the math she isn't working for much over minimum wage. They'll regularly do 12-16 hour shifts when 'on call'. They're salaried so there is no such thing as over time. And while the shifts do rotate throwing your sleep schedule around that much and working that long you pretty much come home, eat and sleep.

Now it obviously gets better but the long hours and low pay aren't something that is just limited to uneducated labor.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[codman1]

"Isn't it odd that now when Samsung gets attacked these heartwarming stories pop up, but when Foxconn (or rather Apple) was attacked for better working conditions, there was silence." The guys and gals at Foxconn were killing themselves because of the working conditions. I don't think there is a comparison.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Splab]

What country is that?

Haven't heard of anyone making it downright illegal to work more than 40 hours.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[NickFortune]

Isn't it odd that now when Samsung gets attacked these heartwarming stories pop up, but when Foxconn (or rather Apple) was attacked for better working conditions, there was silence.

I wouldn't know about that. I did however think it was interesting that this story gets so much exposure at about the same time as Apple is attacking Samsung in a patent war.

It's almost as if some PR type at Apple had said "we've had a lot of negative publicity over workign condtions in the past, and that seems to be counting against us with the general public. Why don't we see what can dig up on Samsung. If we can't make the public see us as good guys, we can at least make sure that Samsung seem tarred with the same brush". I guess someone's taken a leaf out of the old Microsoft Playbook.

If so, I can't help but find it rather sad. I mean all this effort and the best they can muster "my job is boring, but apart from that it's ok?" I mean seriously?

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

South Africa.
Mind you - I left management behind about 5 years ago because I prefer to be a real engineer :P

So if it's changed since then, I wouldn't know, it certainly was the labour law around 2006.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

Politicians don't kill unions, unions kill businesses that are unionised. Unions kill unions.

As to government unions (public sector unions), they shouldn't have never been allowed in the first place.

Private unions are fine, people have the right to associate. However the employer must not be coerced into negotiating with the union collectively, he also has the right to associate.

Even in right to work states, it is actually illegal for an employee to start working in a union shop and then negotiate his terms on his own, the courts have upheld this clearly illegal idea of 'labour peace', where the rights of the individual are destroyed by the union power.

Some info on this in an interview with Mark Mix, president of National Right to Work. This is on unions (minutes 0:40 - 0:49 of that audio interview).

--

USA is becoming a third world country because of democratic votes cast by the majority who wants free bread and circuses for the politicians that promise it, while in reality stealing individual freedoms from people to run their businesses to the best of their abilities without being hindered by the government power. That's why people move production out of USA, while government ends up growing on printed, taxed, borrowed money, that's the reason for USA becoming the 3rd world country.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Farmer Tim]

Some employees, yes. You think the splatter cleans up itself?

Re:I might be out of scope here

[flimflammer]

I don't think it's anyone's business but mine if I want to accept working 80 hours a week. No one is forcing me (if your employer was forcing you then that would be different). The thought that my manager could be sent to jail if I lived where you did over a decision of my own making is what sounds ludicrous to me. Those kind of hours saved me on more than one occasion, and despite stints of varied length working 9am to 10pm at that job, I was never in any danger driving home. Sure if if those kind of hours were physically demanding I could see a problem, but sitting at a desk, or even an assembly line?

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Anonymous Coward]

" I the idea that anybody who has worked a 16 hour day is safe to drive home is just outright ludicrous."

haha, in 'merica, we call those people your doctors, and we work up to 30 hour shifts. big deal.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Ash Vince]

USA is becoming a third world country because of democratic votes cast by the majority who wants free bread and circuses for the politicians that promise it, while in reality stealing individual freedoms from people to run their businesses to the best of their abilities without being hindered by the government power. That's why people move production out of USA, while government ends up growing on printed, taxed, borrowed money, that's the reason for USA becoming the 3rd world country.

So then why is Germany, a country that has a very substantial social security system (free bread) not becoming a third world country. It is currently suffering a little as it is being asked to single handedly bail out the entire continent but that won't last, if the euro splits Germany is the one country that will not be badly affected. It is still an economic power house even with unions, social security, high taxes and business regulation.

The reality is that the US is not becoming a third world country at all, it is just that the wealth is becoming more concentrated in the hands of fewer people. The manual labour might all be getting outsourced to China to but the people running companies profit from this in the short term since it lowers costs.

The other problem with the US is that for the past 50 years it has been spending vastly beyond its means in order to maintain its crazily sized armed forces. Ron Paul was right about this, sooner or later the US is going to be forced to scale back its armed forces and concentrate on self-defence.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[trout007]

Germany is wealthy because it's filled with Germans.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[AmiMoJo]

I don't think it's anyone's business but mine if I want to accept working 80 hours a week. No one is forcing me (if your employer was forcing you then that would be different).

Maybe you do it voluntarily but many people are not lucky enough to have that choice. By doing 80 hour weeks you are pretty much forcing other people to do them as well if they want a job, otherwise they are not going to get the work.

Those kind of hours saved me on more than one occasion

Oh, so actually it wasn't quite as voluntary as you made out.

I was never in any danger driving home. Sure if if those kind of hours were physically demanding I could see a problem, but sitting at a desk, or even an assembly line?

Concentrating for 12+ hours in a day is mentally demanding. I'm sure someone will think of some extremely easy job where it might be possible to work 80 hour weeks safely, but they represent a tiny fraction of the available work and even then only some people in good health will be able to do them safely.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[drinkypoo]

Sitting or standing in one place for hours is unhealthy. It is, in fact, physically demanding.

People who spend too much time working aren't complete people. They become work units.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[trout007]

The problem is you are forcing your values onto another person. What if someone prefers to work 96 hours a week? What if their goal is to save money for something like college. They want to put one year of working 12 hours a day 6 days a week. You think you have the right to say you can't work that much? Go home and sit on the couch and watch TV because that is what I like to do?

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Ozeroc]

That's why they call it a residency. You practically live in the hospital.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[DJRumpy]

For starters, Unions don't implode of their own volition, so they don't exactly kill themselves. That leaves politicians, or bad management and the management of unions is done via voting on policy by the body. In other words, it's a democratic process, controlled by it's members.

Since unions represent the workers, it affects a businesses bottom line, so naturally business hates unions and unions hate business attempts to reap profits at the expense of employees. That said they both understand that they must mutually coexist, and as a result, they each get something from the other in a relatively balanced situation.

You probably had Monday off as a result of Unions. You also get to call in sick without losing your job, and if you are a non-name tag worker, chances are you have paid leave, sick time, and vacation. You can thank unions for that. Days off. Yep; Unions.

The GOP loves to vilify unions because the GOP represents big business. They always have. It is transparent for anyone who steps outside of a certain news channel to see. That in and of itself is fine, but they shouldn't pretend that unions are something they are not. They have existed in the us for a hundred years, and we ended up with the strongest economy on the planet. Reagan started killing them, and now look at where we are.

Do I believe the killing of unions is solely responsible for this? No, but the fact that we built our economy on unions and came to the top spot (again with unions), kind of discredits your idea that they are evil. They have existed in the U.S. for over a hundred years. Also, kindly post any real link where a democrat was demanding free bread, and circuses? If you can't find one, please leave the rhetoric at the door. Its about time people started acting like adults when it comes to politics.

Last but not least regarding government unions. I hate to break it to you, but those employees are also Americans. They have the same rights as you. They pay the same bills. They vote, have children, inherit, and eventually die. Claiming they are somehow a 'subclass' of worker is disingenuous at best and outright contrary to democratic principals at it's worst.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[sjames]

More properly put, the U.S. is becoming a 3rd world country occupied by an unnamed country (that claims IT is the U.S.) where all the wealth goes.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[sjames]

As long as your job doesn't endanger your co-workers or the public if you make fatigue related mistakes, you don't drive home after your 16 hour day and you don't end up on disability later after you've used yourself up, then yes it's nobody's business but yours and your employers ( arguably unless there's qualified people out of work who are ready and willing to be employed).

In other words, yeah, there actually are a few more people involved than you imagine.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

I have spent so much time in Germany over the last 3 years that I can very easily answer all of your questions regarding this topic.

1. Germans are poor. The standard of living is low compared to USA or Canada, that's because people are subsidizing a sizable welfare state, they shouldn't have even done this for the unification of Germany, when the wall fell, but they did. Now they are forced to subsidize huge part of Europe with their productivity and thus destruction of purchasing power.

2. Germans are mostly free of debt, they don't have as much personal debt as Americans do (or people of other countries), they even have savings. Of-course half of their savings were wiped out during the establishment of the Euro zone, Euro stole half of the savings of all Germans just during introduction.

3. German government is not growing compared to US government or governments of other countries. Germany is not subsiding a huge military industrial complex.

4. The retirement and medical benefits are slowly being cut, not increased. There is unfortunately for the economy of Germany all these free loaders from the Euro zone, but they also have plenty of their own free loaders, who are not benefiting the productive economy, they are being subsidized. However Germany allows plenty of immigration from Eastern Europe as well as from places like Turkey, which brings plenty of cheap work force into the country, so this helps to lower the wages inside the country instead of outsourcing to lower wage zones.

However, even given all of this, the companies in Germany ARE collapsing. There are more and more companies going under, do you know what happens in many cases? Foreigners buy them and even keep union contracts afloat for a few years. Actually Chinese are buying up failing (and other) German companies.

So while to you it seems that Germany is doing so much better than USA, it's only a matter of degree. What is happening in Germany is similar to what is happening in USA, except in Germany it's happening SLOWER.

The reasons are being that Germans have much less debt, much higher savings and they are not subsidizing massive military effort.

BTW, Germany is cutting its social spending, that's the right way to go, but they are doing it too slow, so they will have their own crisis in the coming years.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[bluefoxlucid]

Germany is desperately afraid of inflation and will do anything they can to stop it.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[na1led]

If you lived in China, you would still be standing 12 hours in a single shift, working in a shithole.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

As I said: private unions have their right to association, but the public unions are an abomination. Union leaders and politicians are not on the opposite sides of that table, the unions help the politicians and the politicians help union, because it's not their money, what do they care? It's an abomination.

As to private sector unions not 'imploding under their own volition' - it doesn't matter how it happens, unions kill businesses, that's all. It's not because businessmen 'hate' unions, it's because unions prevent efficiencies and thus do not allow costs to drop where they must drop. And costs must drop, if the company doesn't find those efficiencies it will be replaced by a competitor who does.

Also there is no such concept as 'reap profits at the expense of employees'. All profits belong to the owners of the company. I build a company not to give anybody a job, I build a company to make money for myself.

Hiring people is an UNFORTUNATE situation that a businessman has to face, it's bad to hire people, so the best advice to any businessman is not to hire people. Automate, do whatever it takes, outsource, buy tools, reduce the number of employees needed to operate your production facilities, that's the way. That's because it's not just unions (who have a MONOPOLY on labour, why isn't the gov't anti-monopoly law being used to brake up unions exactly, ha?)

It's because of all the regulations that governments pass that make hiring people simply dangerous. Taxes, lawsuits, mandates, whatever it is, once you hire somebody, you are a public enemy number 1. Do yourself a favor, don't hire if you can avoid it.

I already have a comment about all your misconceptions as to why people have better working environment today than they had 200 years ago. The real question is, how come during the time of unprecedented government growth and expansion of power over the last 100 years, the working conditions worsened over the same last 100 years? The answer of-course is that very growth of government, it prevents more efficiencies, it prevents capital formation and it prevents people from doing what they really want to do (grow their own capital) and forces them instead to concentrate too much time and effort trying to go around the government that is standing in the way.

--

One more time about the government unions: they are an abomination. They are Americans alright, but they are not 'paying the same bills', they are a subclass but they are treated like superclass, they are on a permanent welfare, that's what government salary is - permanent welfare. Every time a government employee gets a pay raise, that's all the private sector employees and employers getting a pay cut.

Whatever gov't workers are paid it's the money extracted, stolen from the private sector. ONLY private sector CREATES, the gov't takes and spends what was taken for whatever purpose, but not to create anything, it's always to spend, to take, to have a program and to skim off top. Gov't workers don't pay taxes, the money they have came from real taxes, their taxes are a ruse, it's just a smaller salary that they are getting. None of that 'tax' money is money that gov't didn't already have, it's an accounting gimmick.

Gov't must exist it has a role, but it has nothing to do with the economy, it must exist to protect people's individual freedoms and secure the borders, there is nothing else, not infrastructure, not health care, not insurance, not education, none of it, that it should be involved with.

Pointing out at other countries as if they are a success while being more socialist mises the point. The free market capitalism created the most prosperous country on the planet in 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, not because of gov't, because of LACK of gov't, that's why people came to USA - to get away from their totalitarian governments. That's why people are leaving USA now and will be leaving in bigger and bigger numbers.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Plumpaquatsch]

"Isn't it odd that now when Samsung gets attacked these heartwarming stories pop up, but when Foxconn (or rather Apple) was attacked for better working conditions, there was silence." The guys and gals at Foxconn were killing themselves because of the working conditions. I don't think there is a comparison.

Apart from the fact that they weren't - Samsung does the worker killing themselves.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Plumpaquatsch]

Isn't it odd that now when Samsung gets attacked these heartwarming stories pop up, but when Foxconn (or rather Apple) was attacked for better working conditions, there was silence.

I wouldn't know about that. I did however think it was interesting that this story gets so much exposure at about the same time as Apple is attacking Samsung in a patent war.

And I find it odd that the lamestream media has suppressed any reports on Samsungs wrongdoings for so long. So boo-hoo-hoo.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

Not 'Germany', Germans are afraid of inflation. Germany is a concept that really means 'politicians', doesn't it? While Merkel was playing all the lip service to being fiscally responsible, she is now committed to printing all the currency it takes to 'prevent collapse of the Eurozone'. Ironically printing the currency is exactly the opposite of what is needed to prevent a total collapse.

Inflation is money printing, nothing else, all fiat currencies go to 0 over time, none last. While most countries of the world that had either very high inflation or even hyper inflation over the past 100 years went on the 'US dollar standard' (tied their exchange rates to US dollars artificially), once USA in the position that it can no longer borrow except from the Fed, and can no longer buy any products from abroad, USA won't be able to go back to the 'US dollar standard', because it's the dollar itself that will be destroyed.

AFAIC eventually there will be no choice for the people but to use real money. I am not talking about what governments will want, I am saying that people will want to survive and to survive they will have to buy tools and products from those, who still make tools and products, and those who make tools and products will want real money, and that's how people will go towards real money, not because of government.

Governments always take the real money that people choose to use and then screw it up, set up fake money by decree (fiat) and use it to grow the government itself. All governments are mafia, whether 'elected' or whatever. Democracy is only a temporary state, just like Republic is a temporary state. Republic only lasts as long as it produces enough wealth to give birth to the new type of gov't that finds out how to grow itself by using the wealth created by the Republic. Then it's the time of Democracy, and Democracy always leads to tyranny.

This Democracy has led to tyranny already, but wait until the dollar collapses, then you'll find out what real tyranny looks like.

That's why Germans are afraid of inflation, and they are right, they have already gone through this last century.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[DJRumpy]

Talk about monovision. Demand is not born in a vacuum. Your arguments are so business centric (one sided) that is difficult to decide where to begin.

Union money: you dislike it (abomination?) because they donate to a party you dislike. I hate to break it to you but you are not on this rock alone. That doesn't make everyone else wrong. Anyone has the right to give money to politics. Even businesses and I don't hear you peeping about those.

Unions killing business: poor management kills business, not unions. Treat your employees well and you'll be fine. 100+ years of unions in the U.S. World power. Nuff said.

Profits and hiring employees: This one is so far off base it's just funny. Tell me, where do you think your customers will earn money to buy your goods and services? You can't have business without demand. It is never a one sided equation. The math doesn't work.

Please enlighten us as to how work conditions have worsened. Your idea that somehow employers will somehow make things better for workers on their own has already been proven wrong by history. That's why we have regulation today. Do you think a factory would install pollution controls at great expense because it was a good thing to keep the air breathable? No. They do so because they are required to by law.

Welfare: look it up. When one works for a paycheck, it's NOT welfare. I don't think that word means what you think it means...

One need only look to places like China and Malaysia too see what the lack of unions provides. We aren't exactly short on examples. Business profits are made on the backs of the labor used to provide or create those services whether hat is you as an individual or via the employees you hire. Profits are made from demand. Demand comes from the consumer. No money for the consumer means no business. It's a pretty basic concept of an economy. Businesses cannot exist in a universe unto themselves. Hate to burst your bubble.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

Nope, I don't.
But I do have a right to say that if your boss asks you to do that HE is violating everybody else's freedom and I certainly have a right to say that if you have DONE that then you shouldn't qualify for tax-funded medical care (since your early death is caused by your own stupidity), you sure as hell aren't allowed to drive (but by all means, take the bus).

See the thing is though, there is SO much that I can RIGHTFULLY tell you you CANNOT do if you do that (on the basis that if you do you ARE infringing on MY freedoms) - and so little that is LEFT, that it's really simpler to just ban it outright because frankly you really are NOT losing anything that's worth the price *I* have to pay for YOUR drug addiction.

And yes, working that much IS an addiction. Not all drugs are chemicals.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Noughmad]

1. Germans are poor. The standard of living is low compared to USA or Canada

2. Germans are mostly free of debt, they don't have as much personal debt as Americans do

You have it right there. Yes, USA has the highest standard of living, but that's because both individuals and the government keep spending money they don't have.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[bluefoxlucid]

Yes, the Germans are afraid of inflation because inflation ended with Hitler last time. They don't want Hitler again.

You know Hitler was just a regular guy that got lucky? Think about it. Let's look at Hitler. Read Mein Kampf in German; the English translations are lame.

Hitler correctly noticed that the whole of Germany was turning into social democrats ruining the economy. He also correctly noticed that the movement was driven by an extremely biased media. He ALSO correctly noticed that the Jews were running the major media. Then ... he made the incorrect logical conclusion that executing all the Jews would solve the problem.

This is akin to city folk Americans noticing that mechanic shops run by blacks do a terrible job and mostly overcharge and scam their customers for poor work, and drawing the conclusion that mechanic shops that are bad are run by blacks, and thus executing all the blacks would eliminate all the badness and we'd only have white folks running things like mechanic shops and restaurants and the Government and that would solve all our problems. You know this actually happens. A lot of people don't like blacks--I get told all the time that white areas are pristine low-crime safe havens and black areas are high-crime murder traps. A lot of old people don't like asians AT ALL because of Pearl Harbor, they think all Asians are going to bomb their houses. Muslims are weird and fashionable to hate these days too.

Hitler was a normal guy who tried to change the world for the better. Like any normal guy, he was incredibly stupid and figured that one social group that happens to hold majority and poor behavior in a particular facet of society as he's familiar with must be the root cause of all problems, and that exterminating them would fix everything. In America we actually did this--as a matter of policy, handed down even from the government--with the native americans. We did it with Germans and Asians, and on a social level we do it to blacks, muslims, and arabs. There are plenty of people in the US right now who would especially just round up all arabs and muslims and execute them, people who advocate the banning and burning of mosques. Congress held a several hour long hearing to decide if they want to go that route, routing out all the Muslims from the country--this was seriously considered, we debated going to war against Islam.

The Germans don't want major inflation to give them another Hitler. Another Hitler wouldn't be unreasonable either; there's plenty worse than Hitler, like Mao. Our world is full of people who would love to be Hitler, they have an idea of who they'd like to remove from their society or from our world entirely. This is a scenario we cannot allow.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

Demand is not born in a vacuum

- I know that most people don't understand even the most basic concepts of what demand and supply is, what consumption and production is.

As long as there are people or other living creatures, their demand is infinite. Do you have Enterprise spaceship? A submarine? An jet? A yacht? Do you want it?

Most people want those things but they can't afford them. In case of spaceship you can't have it because it doesn't exist.

Same thing with all the other things - they don't exist in quantities enough to meet your price points. The reason for it is that it takes much more productivity to create them than you can offer in return. People don't exchange goods for funny looking pieces of paper, people exchange productivity for productivity.

If you are a wheat farmer and you have no wheat, you have demand, but until you grow that crop your demand is irrelevant, it can't be satisfied, because there is no supply.

Supply always comes first, no exceptions. Supply always comes first. If there is no supply, your demand is irrelevant.

A businessman takes risk when he uses his savings (or even when he takes out a loan, other people's savings) and tries to build production that makes something that didn't exist before. He has to work plenty to create supply and he doesn't know that his productivity will allow him to reach efficiency that is high enough so that he can meet the price points of his potential customers.

When iPads came out nobody had them, nobody thought of them as of something to demand. Apple made them and people realized they wanted them (advertising and all, but people who bought them could afford them because they were productive enough in order to exchange some of their productivity for the productivity of Apple).

You can't buy a 1000 feet yacht (most likely) because you don't produce enough to be able to afford it. But you want it. If you don't want the yacht, then you want something else you can't afford.

Again, consumption is a trivial consequence of production, not the other way around. The Sun existed BEFORE people and every other living creature could appear on this planet, so the productivity of the star existed much before you came alone with your demand, and certainly you want that energy from that star, though you can't actually afford it, but you must have it before you even can exist. That is something that we get for free in this life, otherwise we wouldn't be here. However whatever PEOPLE make, (not nature, like the stars), that you have to pay for by making something back, by producing something in exchange, otherwise you can't have it. You can't demand something from people without producing something back.

----

Union money: you dislike it (abomination?) because they donate to a party you dislike.

- what are you talking about? I dislike government unions because they are an abomination, they shouldn't exist. The tax payers and everybody else who pays for their existence through inflation and diminished standard of living is NOT at the table when they make their demands.

Who is at the table? The politicians. The people who have plenty to gain from union support by giving them money that they steal from people, that is who is 'at the table'. That's not negotiations, that's 2 wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner.

Unions killing business: poor management kills business, not unions. Treat your employees well and you'll be fine. 100+ years of unions in the U.S. World power. Nuff said.

- yeah, it took a long time to squander the wealth that was created by the free market capitalism in USA. As I said earlier, Theodore Roosevelt was really at the beginning of that destruction. Of-course 1971 with Nixon accelerated that destruction by an n'th degree, defaulting on the dollar and allowing the gov't to print to grow - the inflation tax.

Profits and hiring employ

Re:I might be out of scope here

[jittles]

But I'm pretty sure that when I lived in crapsack podunk land as a teenager, I had stood for 12 hours in a single shift working at the shithole state fair cleaning barns for not much more than minimum wage.

Seriously. And here in the US I have worked over 100 hours in a single week. My first job was working for a company that sold hardware that required a very high level of reliability. Some stupid sales person sold a customer a project that hadn't even reached beta and the company board signed off on it, since it was such a huge contract. The product was in such terrible shape that they needed a pair of engineers on site to keep the system running. We would spend 18 hours a day on site for 10 days straight before heading home and trying to fix the problems we saw while we were on site. While we were there we wrote scripts and other things to help automate the process. After 6 months of software tweaking, scripting, and such, we were able to replace the on-site engineers with product support. Thankfully i was non-exempt salary. I made an absolute killing that year.

I will say that after a while, your free time becomes more valuable than all the overtime in the world, but you can experience that kind of work week anywhere, if you let your company treat you that way. My friends and I did such a great job that we all ended up getting huge promotions after that, and the company took great care of us while we were still there. They even let us use the corporate jet on holidays, so that we could see family.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[jellomizer]

God help us, if we try to work hard. Some jobs just don't work well in a 8 hour shift. Or some people want to get the extra money for the extra time put in. Yes lets force them to work 8 hours a day, and get paid less. That will fix the economy, by paying people less.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[DJRumpy]

Do you think if a farmer grows a crop that is designed to spoil within 24 hours, his business will thrive once he produces it? Of course not. No one would buy such a crop. No demand.

Are you seriously suggesting that any business can just create something and hope that once they create it, that will create demand? You would be laughed out of business school.

You are taught to find a market. A market is created by demand. Supply on the other hand, when combined with demand, establishes price/value. Lack of supply can SEEM to increase demand but it only makes the lack of supply available to meet existing demand more obvious.

Any business producing an unwanted good wold quickly fold. Why? No demand for its goods.

You should really go back and take some remedial business courses. Your understanding of how an economy works is completely askew.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

Do you think if a farmer grows a crop that is designed to spoil within 24 hours, his business will thrive once he produces it? Of course not. No one would buy such a crop. No demand.

- why in the world would I be coming up with weird scenarios that are irrelevant to the real world?

A crop that is spoiled within 24 hours? Well, I'll tell you what happens to that farmer then in the free market economy. In the free market economy that farmer goes bankrupt, because he is so stupid that he doesn't realize that growing such a crop doesn't even give him the window of time to move the crop from his barn to the mill.

I don't know why you are talking about crops that spoil in 24 hours though, I have never heard of farmers that stupid and crops that weird, maybe that's because they only exist in your fantasy.

Are you seriously suggesting that any business can just create something and hope that once they create it, that will create demand? You would be laughed out of business school.

- All demand is created by supply. Every business that produces something hopes that there will be a way to generate profit on the sale.

Every businessman takes a risk when he starts a business by investing his time, money and effort into building something. Oh, sure, almost anything can be given away FOR FREE or at least at a price point that is below cost (below production price), but building a successful business where the product is sold with a premium in it that provides profit is always a risk a businessman has to take.

What if somebody else is building the same thing at the same time with that businessman, but the other guy is doing it better? What if by the time this businessman produces his product it's already irrelevant because there is a better substitute on the market? Etc.etc.etc.

The only way YOU would not be laughed out of life if you tried to sell the idea that a business can be built without risk, is by suggesting that the business in question gets a government guarantee for everything: loans, clients.

How about that Solyndra, the loans are guaranteed, so nobody loses but the tax payers. The clients? Well, who gives a shit about clients, the loans are guaranteed.

How about government insurance? The clients are guaranteed, the money is guaranteed, everything is guaranteed. That is exactly how the bubbles are inflated in stock markets (Great Depression, the nineties), housing market, etc. That's how the government is inflating the dollar and bond bubble right now, with the Federal reserve and Bernanke's put for all the debt US Treasury (and other US entities) are creating.

You are taught to find a market. A market is created by demand.

- There is always a market for your amazing widgets, that's not the question. The question is can the people afford your amazing product or not. That's the risk.

As I said: human demand is infinite. Human supply on the other hand is very much limited. If you build a business and you already have a client base, then you can use statistics to account for a possible growth or decline in your market, then you can start looking for efficiencies to decrease your costs and reach bigger markets.

But it doesn't matter that demand is infinite. Demand for personal helicopters may be infinite, but the ability to pay for the personal helicopters is very limited because most people do not produce enough to exchange for the productivity needed to build a personal helicopter.

There are no 'unwanted' goods, there are only people who can't afford goods even though they demand them. Even that silly CueCat was in demand, except the price point was below cost of making those widgets. People wanted the CueCat, except they didn't want it at the price that it was offered at and they wanted to do things with it that the producer disagreed with.

I am done with back and forth 'you have no idea on economy' stuff, it's boring.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[pnutjam]

Have you ever worked in Government? The bosses change all the time, how can you collude with a revolving door? Every worker is entitled to form a group to bargain, why is that so difficult? The voters are the ones who decide what the bosses policies are. The union has no control, they are just trying to maintain a smooth relationship.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[hawguy]

What truck? I drove an '81 civic. The only truck I got to drive was an old Datsun pickup when I needed to run to pick up repair parts or put a flashing yellow light on top to escort a large truck. For some reason they didn't trust the young seasonal workers with their $150,000 dump trucks.

I had no serious accidents those summers, but had a couple close calls. Once was one late night when a drunk driver crossed the center line, forcing me off the road and into some light brush. Just lost the some plastic molding under the car but the car was otherwise fine -- the other driver swerved off the road and ended up stuck in a field - one of my coworkers in a company truck came by and radioed in a call to the police and a towtruck and they nabbed him for DUI. Oh and one early morning on a rural road I narrowly avoided a deer, but he escaped unscathed and that's when I decided to put a set of driving lights on the car.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Americano]

But I do have a right to say that if your boss asks you to do that HE is violating everybody else's freedom

Which freedoms is he violating, exactly? The freedom to never be in a room with someone who worked a long, hard day today?

I certainly have a right to say that if you have DONE that then you shouldn't qualify for tax-funded medical care

Ah yes, if you're poor and want to work more hours to try and not be poor, we'll let you die in the streets. Don't try to rise above your station, poor people!

you sure as hell aren't allowed to drive (but by all means, take the bus).

That's right - you don't need a car, you can take shitty public transportation to one of the few jobs that happen to be in reasonable public transit range of your ghetto home. Don't be polluting up our nice suburbs with your crappy vehicles, take the train here, clean my house, and take the train home.

Really, I'm with you friend - I also think that poor people should learn to be happy with whatever money they HAPPEN to earn in their 40 hours of drudgery each week, and should stop whining about wanting to "get ahead" with an "education" and a "better home" and a "better standard of living for their family."

Let them eat cake, indeed!

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Fned]

Maybe you do it voluntarily but many people are not lucky enough to have that choice. By doing 80 hour weeks you are pretty much forcing other people to do them as well if they want a job, otherwise they are not going to get the work.

It's worse than that -- the selfish prick is also putting someone else out of a job entirely, by allowing his employer to not have to hire another person to put the hours in.

Under normal economic conditions, people with two or three jobs are hard-working and industrious. When there are four unemployed people per open position, people with two or three jobs are fucking assholes.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[shutdown -p now]

History has shown that when employers are allowed to make their workers work for 80-100 hour work weeks, that's precisely what everyone else ends up working. Furthermore, they don't actually paid more, so it won't help them to "get ahead with education" etc in the slightest.

See also: Gilded Age.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[shutdown -p now]

Capitalism is orthogonal to free market. Yes, US is capitalist. No, it does not have a free market. Most capitalist states don't.

Also, yes, US is a democracy. It's also a republic. Again, different things, not contradictory.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Americano]

But employers are NOT "making their workers work for 80-100 hour work weeks." *SOME* Workers are volunteering for it, because they need and/or want more money. Hell, some workers are simply working TWO jobs, and getting no overtime from either, in order to save some cash up.

You'd have a point if we all lived in factory towns with one major employer, or if we didn't live in a society where there are already significant worker-protection and overtime laws on the books. The workers we're talking about who are volunteering to work 20 or 40 hours of overtime a week ARE being paid more because of this (see: cops), and that's *why* they're volunteering; or they're working a full time job and a part time job, or a full time job and two part time jobs, to pay bills and save.

See also: The progressive age, which followed the gilded age, and enacted sweeping labor reforms, many of which are still in place today.

Silentcoder's point above was that if you want to volunteer to work lots of hours, you should be marginalized and exempted from any social benefits - want to work two jobs to save money for your kids to go to college? Tough, no healthcare for you, no car for you, you wanted to work more, and didn't want to depend on the benevolent largesse of a government handout to determine your standard of living. In fact, since you'd be paying taxes on your income, you'd actually be paying into a system that actively marginalizes you and gives your tax money to other people to reward them for not choosing to work hard.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[CaptainNerdCave]

Under _any_ economic conditions, people with two or three jobs are hard-working and industrious. When there are four unemployed people per open position, the position often remains open because the unemployed are too lazy to apply or management has unrealistic expectations of who they want to hire.

Forcing someone not to work is just as morally deplorable as forcing someone to work.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[formfeed]

The reality is that the US is not becoming a third world country at all, it is just that the wealth is becoming more concentrated in the hands of fewer people.

That's what I was thinking of.

Extreme wealth differences are very typical for 3rd world country. Only one side is the "TV 3rd world" with starving people, but the other side are gated communities with an upper class that surpasses the west in wealth.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Americano]

If you're the one trying to get off of government handouts, why are you complaining that they'll take away your government handouts? That's the very thing you're trying to get off of isn't it?

So you prefer to create a citizenry entirely dependent on the government for every aspect of their life, rather than viewing government programs as a way to help people improve their lives and wean themselves OFF of reliance on government.

The rich pays for the bulk of your health care and your roads. So why shouldn't they have a say (more say) than you on whether your health or the roads or that car loan (if you can pay for your car in full out of pocket, you aren't that poor) is covered by THEIR money?

That's right, poor people should learn to enjoy being poor, and stay poor, rather than try to rise and challenge the supremacy of the ruling class. Who are they to want to take responsibility for their own lives and futures, when the "rich" people (or, "ruling class") have provided such a generous subsistence allowance for them, and allowed them to work in their factories, farm their land, rent their property, and ride their public transportation?

It's not often that one is confronted by naked, leering, grasping, acquisitive evil; I'm glad you've provided us with an opportunity to see it here.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

>Really, I'm with you friend - I also think that poor people should learn to be happy with whatever money they HAPPEN to earn in their 40 hours of drudgery each week, and should stop whining about wanting to "get ahead" with an "education" and a "better home" and a "better standard of living for their family."

If workers need to work MORE than 40 hours a week to have enough money to invest in things like education and self-improvement. that in itself is exploitation.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

> Tough, no healthcare for you
I merely said that you shouldn't be able to get healthcare I pay for if your disease is self-inflicted. By the same token I oppose helmet laws, but if you get into an accident without one - you should only be allowed to get private medical care. If you were wearing your helmet, I'll be happy to have the state-hospital I help fund get you better.

> no car for you
I said no "driving while severely fatigued" that IS intruding on MY liberties. I have the right to expect that every driver on the road is sober and capable of relatively safe driving. Driver fatigue has been shown to be at least as dangerous as drunk driving. That's my life you're risking. I have a right to deny you the opportunity to do so.

> didn't want to depend on the benevolent largesse of a government handout to determine your standard of living

There is no such thing. However, if you wish to make use a government hand-up to help improve your quality of life, I am happy that a share of my taxes helps you to do that.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

>That's right, poor people should learn to enjoy being poor, and stay poor, rather than try to rise and challenge the supremacy of the ruling class.

The way to do that is not to accept their bullshit and destroy every OTHER aspect of your life trying to earn a living. It's to demand, by all the means available to us (including strike action and unionisation for collective bargaining) to demand decent living wages.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Americano]

And what constitutes a "decent living wage"?

Enough to put food on the table, a roof over your head, a reasonably reliable vehicle in the garage, health care, and schools for the kiddos?

Great, so you've "provided me" with that.

Now I want a modest, week-long family vacation on the beach in Florida. And a nicer car. And a bigger tv, or a second tv so that I can watch the shows I want while my kids watch dancing with the stars. Oh, and my kid, who's really into computers, he'd like a laptop and I want to encourage his interest in computer programming since it can turn into a pretty good career for him down the road, so I want to get that for him. And my daughter sings like an angel, and really wants to take voice & guitar lessons, and I want to support that too, because I love her.

So how do I get all that? What magical government program will swoop in and magically raise MY standard of living? Or do I have to tell my son, "Sorry kid, I worked in the factory, and you'll work in the factory just like me," and tell my daughter, "singing is the devil's work, you should just strive to marry rich and have babies," and tell my wife, "I know you want to go to Florida this year for vacation, but instead, we can set up a sprinkler in the backyard, and PRETEND like it's the beach, it's almost the same thing!"

With benevolent overlords like you, it's impossible for me to imagine how you'd possibly end up on the guillotine during the inevitable revolution that will wrack your perfect society.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[khallow]

Reagan started killing them, and now look at where we are.

Well, the US beat off Japan's economic assault, for starters. That happened over the critical time frame in question. Now that the US is duplicating on a similar scale, Japan's post-recession strategy in the 90s, I imagine we'll see similar failure on similar scales for similar durations.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[silentcoder]

>Great, so you've "provided me" with that.

When did I say 'provided' by ME ? It's what you're supposed to be paid for working. It's earned. If you don't get paid enough for at least most of those (the vehicle isn't so needed methinks) then you're being ripped off.

>So how do I get all that? What magical government program will swoop in and magically raise MY standard of living?

Why do you keep saying government should do it ? I never did. I said that your salary should at least be enough that you can invest in some additional education - so you can work your way up, until you can afford that with what you are paid. Or save up some capital and start your own business.

I'm all for people doing it WITHOUT government assistance - hence I'm against allowing companies to keep people so poor that they have no possible opportunity to do so.

The clencher? I'm a fucking anarchist. In my concept of an ideal world - there IS no government. People themselves should have a DIRECT vote on all laws. We should get an EQUAL say in the laws we live under.
I consider that a basic human right.

So where in THAT system do you see this government you're so afraid off ? I don't believe anybody should have power over another person. This applies to politicians - but unlike those idiotic American versions of libertarianism (which aren't libertarian at all because they only ever read economists version of a POLITICAL philosophy and none of them have ever read an actual philosophy treatise on it) - I realize that a corporate CEO is JUST as scary as a politician.
I believe we can do without the politicians entirely - we can't do without the businesses, but we need to keep their power limited.

That great bastion of the free market: Adam Smith, wrote that the only stable form of capitalism is one where labour the most expensive resource in the market, because high profit margins for business is entirely and exclusively bad for society, but high wages for workers is entirely and exclusively good for society.
I think Smith knew more than people like you do - even as American libertarians LOVE to quote him - none of them actually know what the guy REALLY said.
Here's a hint: Smith proposed a pension system similar to America's social security more than 200 years before you had one. He didn't JUST declare it a sound economic concept, he also called it a moral imperative if a society is to be free.

So stop attacking the strawman of state-socialism because it doesn't apply to me. I'm a left-libertarian. I believe in the absense of government, in the destruction of authority and the equality of man.
Washington thought the only legitimate government was done with the consent of the governed.
I take it a step further: the only legitimate government is the CONSENSUS of the governed themselves.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[udachny]

Here is something educational for you to watch, I am sure you'll enjoy it.

Re:I might be out of scope here

[Americano]

So stop attacking the strawman of state-socialism because it doesn't apply to me. I'm a left-libertarian. I believe in the absense of government, in the destruction of authority and the equality of man.

Sorry to break this to you, but no, you're not a left-libertarian if you're making the following arguments, quoted directly from your original post:

if you have DONE that then you shouldn't qualify for tax-funded medical care (since your early death is caused by your own stupidity)

Since, you know, for tax-funded healthcare to exist in the first place, it requires a government who is taxing people to pay for that healthcare.

you sure as hell aren't allowed to drive (but by all means, take the bus).

And what mechanism do you propose to use to force stop people from driving after working lots of overtime, o rabid 'anarchist'?

it's really simpler to just ban it outright

What a surprise. A self-proclaimed "anarchist" who believes that he oughta have the right to unilaterally ban things and force other people to behave as he wants them to. Quelle surprise!

oh the humanity

[Anonymous Coward]

uhhh, wut? 100 hours per month? where do i sign up for THAT?

also "audit its suppliers in china" basically means "if every single person doesnt make the cut then you and everyone you work with will have to be fired and you have to try to find another job"

Re:oh the humanity

[__aaltlg1547]

I think that's 100 hours of overtime. I don't know what is considered a full time non-overtime week in China. In America, 100 hours of overtime/month would mean 75 hour workweeks.

Re:oh the humanity

[sortadan]

wonder if they get time and a half. if only they worked for apple with 180hrs over time right now working on the new iDevices (http://chinalaborwatch.org/news/new-415.html)

also, using "wut" in a thread titled "oh the humanity" ... sigh.

Re:oh the humanity

[TrancePhreak]

Nobody came to my help when I worked 80 hours a week for five months straight.

Re:oh the humanity

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because 80 hour weeks is only 10 8 hour days.

Per week : )

Re:oh the humanity

[bluefoxlucid]

What's basically happening here is the working conditions aren't that bad, but a labor union type company (with interest in showing how horrible working conditions get when you don't band together and beat your employer with a giant cock) is screaming that conditions are terrible.

By some standards, American working hours are ridiculous and terrible. The Italians wouldn't stand for it. On the other hand, $100/mo is enough to live pretty well in Romania; in China they get some money and they live on it, and people are like "well they get like $500/mo it's so horrible" but with $500/mo one man supports his entire family with a (small) home and food. Try doing that in America.

Re:oh the humanity

[Ixitar]

I spent time in China as a consulting Software Architect. People at where I worked were working a standard 40 hour work week.

The project I was on in Korea had people working a 12 hour day. When I say working, I mean that they were there for 12 hours, but I did not see 12 hours worth of work. You did not leave work before your boss did.

Every country has its working culture. A lot of the internal differences are based on education level. I know that there are workers in China that want to work the overtime to make more money and are annoyed by foreigners trying to push the foreign standards on them and are taking money away from them.

yea but

[Osgeld]

what do you expect?

its a factory assembly job with very low entry requirements, just like everywhere else, you do your thing, all day every day, for a modest pay that can support your family if your not living beyond your means.

surprise!

now if we can get Americans to accept that "detailing cars" is not a 50$ an hour job maybe we can regain our strength

Re:yea but

[Haawkeye]

That is the same in Canada as well. I think it is the younger generation. For some reason they think they are owed something! They are owed a kick in the ass!

Re:yea but

[Osgeld]

oh I know, I saw a story on 60 minutes, where "some guy" couldnt afford his frankly lavish house in california cause he lost his 40$ an hour car detailing job. 10 years older than I, I couldnt do anything but be boggled at how someone with an high school education doing a job that damn near any teenager does EVERY Saturday can sit in front of national TV and shed a tear.

Re:yea but

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they have lawns in Canada, that people may be told to get off them?

Re:yea but

[__aaltlg1547]

How would they know if they can't get a fucking job?

Re:yea but

[VortexCortex]

I worked on an assembly line in the USA building solid state motor control devices (for 240v loads up to 19000 volt motors, like rock crushers). We took two 15 minutes breaks, and a 30min break for lunch. When we worked 12 hour days we took another 15min break and another 30min off for dinner. We weren't standing on our feet for longer than a few hours at a time. We also were cross trained in different areas so that we didn't have to do the same repetitious task over and over again (so we didn't ruin our hands). Eventually I was cross trained on every part of the lines from cutting holes for displays in enclosures, to painting them, using the programming the CNC machine, mounting parts, wiring and even testing them.

When another area was too slow or short staffed we could put more folks on that line. There were less problems between divisions than at other companies where everyone was stuck on the same area (even those places had a variety of different tasks for each worker). Folks who knew the whole place could take a prototype from start to finish and document the assembly process to go with the engineering schematics), eventually such people become a managers with desk jobs who actually understood how things work.

There's no reason to have folks doing the exact same repetitive task day in day out for years, ruining them. We need to make more stuff in the USA. I used to prefer to spend a little more on products with the "Made in the USA" logo because I knew the workers weren't being used up and thrown away, like they do in China. Nowadays I don't buy things with that proud USA logo anymore, but only because they don't exist.

If we can't get them to manufacture things in the USA, then we need to get the foreign plants to increase their workers rights. Maybe we impose a tariff? I don't know what the answer is. Folks with morals don't have choices anymore. I make money developing software for the devices, so I have to buy them wherever they're made. What's your fucking excuse?

Re:yea but

[mug funky]

that's cause our generation and the one before it spent a hefty amount of time telling them how great they are...

Re:yea but

[mug funky]

NO! this is just the attitude that has destroyed the western work ethic!

instead of telling them to get off our lawn, we should ask them to mow it.

Re:yea but

[SuperKendall]

In Canada you tell people to get off the moose.

Although usually they don't really need to be told.

Re:yea but

[rastilin]

Why? For one thing, how are people supposed to "work their way through uni" except by unskilled labor? Lowering minimum wage just means that people who are born poor will find it harder and harder to work their way out. It's not like American unskilled labor doesn't get paid terrible wages already compared to any other first world country.

Re:yea but

[TheLink]

There's no reason to have folks doing the exact same repetitive task day in day out for years, ruining them.We need to make more stuff in the USA.

Sure, but they'll be made by robots and factory automation. Doing the same task day in and out is what robots are good at.

And when the robots get cheap, efficient and flexible enough, they'll replace even the Chinese workers. Foxconn are already replacing some jobs with robots - since the cost of their Chinese workers have been increasing.

So where will the jobs be? I doubt 100% of those people losing their jobs will get similar paying jobs because:
1) The whole idea is to cut costs and save money.
2) We're supposed to be eco friendly and not rip out so much resources/wealth per second from the planet.
3) In an ultra capitalist society the increased productivity (by robots etc) can't be consumed by people with no jobs and no money. Initially the people without jobs could still consume the cheaper goods, but they will run out of cash and credit after a while.

So unless you have make work or a guaranteed minimum income, there's going to be a big bunch of poor people with miserable lives once the rich own almost everything and don't need the poor people.

Or maybe people could make virtual goods to sell. There's plenty of virtual goods you can make... And that might be why the USA is pushing for strong IP everywhere- doesn't look like they will go the guaranteed minimum income way.

That said people may not have money, but they might still have the vote (assuming a democracy), not sure what they can do with it though ;).

Re:yea but

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Whats wrong with that? The fact that you probably think not living beyond your means includes living without health care in a country that price gouges everything and treats its workers like shit.

America. Land of the scumbag.

Re:yea but

[Ostracus]

Naw, piracy takes the potential out of virtual anything. Being exploited by the masses or being exploited by the rich is still exploitation.

Re:yea but

[drinkypoo]

now if we can get Americans to accept that "detailing cars" is not a 50$ an hour job maybe we can regain our strength

It's called supply and demand. And let us not forget liability. I sure wouldn't fuck around with other people's cars for less. If I break something I have to replace it and one piece of plastic can trivially be more than fifty bucks.

Re:yea but

[drinkypoo]

Look, I'm not an auto detailer, but most people don't do what detailers do. They don't take as much stuff out and so on. Unless you're removing bezels dirt is just going to creep out from behind them again. They don't have the range of product and they don't have the range of tools, all the little fiddly brushes and picks. That's why people are willing to pay for the service, it's better.

Re:yea but

[Ash Vince]

If we can't get them to manufacture things in the USA, then we need to get the foreign plants to increase their workers rights. Maybe we impose a tariff? I don't know what the answer is. Folks with morals don't have choices anymore. I make money developing software for the devices, so I have to buy them wherever they're made. What's your fucking excuse?

The problem is that even with the increase in workers rights it is often still cheaper to manufacture stuff abroad. In the case of most things Samsung make it is because the raw materials they need like rare earths are only being dug up in that part of the world now.

They used to be mined in the US but the mine closed when the price of rare earths was low few years ago (China flooded the market). This was a clear case where it was stupid to let that mine close, it should have been subsidised or an import tariff applied in order to keep it open and thus keep the factories that depended on it here as well. The problem is that both import tariffs and business subsidies are frowned upon by the WTO and the US has spent years taking other countries to the WTO courts to prevent them from doing this, so it makes it very hard for us to do it now.

The fact is that basing your economy on pure capitalist ideals makes it easy for another country like China to come along and game the system and put you at a disadvantage if they are willing to make some sacrifices. In China's case they are sacrificing their own currencies value in order to shore up their manufacturing and exports as they peg the value of their currency to the dollar instead of letting its value move freely.

China also uses state run and financed businesses to ensure it is always on top. Any export contract to China usually has a clause that ultimately results in the work being done in China by the end of the contract even if they lack the skills to do it at the beginning. This forces you to train a foreign competitor who will ultimately cut you out of the deal. They pay more for these clauses in the short term and it generates more profit for the foreign company initially but in the long term is commercial suicide. This sort of short termism is what is really harming the US.

Re:yea but

[bluefoxlucid]

Why? There are a lot of engineers. There are 2000 here but we only need to hire 500; 1500 of you can go rot in hell. Enjoy your government funded debt.

Re:yea but

[sjames]

What will actually happen is either people will start getting paid more fro working less (sharing the benefits of our technical advances) or eventually a bunch of poor people will literally tear the rich limb from limb by hand in a bloody revolution.

Re:yea but

[Captain.Abrecan]

You seem knowledgeable about this. Any hope to get Coca-Cola stains (or stains in general) out of plastic of all things? It's the only thing I can't seem to clean/fix, aside from cigarette holes in microfiber *shudder*. Next car, no smoking from the start.

Re:yea but

[sjames]

That has been tried many times throughout history, and it has never failed to end in a bloodbath.

Re:yea but

[drinkypoo]

If it's actually stained, all you can do is paint or dye over it. It depends very much on what the surface is made of, though, and how it was finished. If the color is molded in or if it didn't penetrate the paint you can wet sand it out if you can remove the piece.

Re:yea but

[ToddInSF]

"The petition you are trying to access has expired, because it failed to meet the signature threshold."

Re:yea but

[bluefoxlucid]

Oh fine I'll change my signature.

Re:yea but

[ToddInSF]

A link to a nonexistent petition is not "a signature".

Advocating for the starvation of children, the sick ,and disabled is hardly something to brag about.

Re:yea but

[bluefoxlucid]

Shrug. It's a core tenant of Socialism. I want to see how many socialist liberals go ape shit at it.

Re:yea but

[mug funky]

something on your mind?

it's the sign of a petulant child to blame it's parents. though it is completely natural.

sooner or later one has to grow up, realise that we only have what we have, we can't change the past, so let's try to wrench the present into a half-decent future.

i'm quite new at the parenting game - my son's only 15 months old. but the idea that i would try to stiff him or his generation for my own comfort is sort of insulting.

we all want the same thing, but we have different ideas of how to get there. i can't blame the generation above me because, with what they had, they acted in a way no different to how we would have acted. crowds can be more predictable than individuals, and applying the crowd model to our generation with the initial conditions of the previous generation will likely yield the same result.

though it's tempting to believe everything is getting worse (i'm convinced it's a uniquely human quality that helps keep us doing our human thing - improving things), you should probably speak to someone REALLY old and ask how things went for them back in the day.

Wait...

[tooyoung]

Why would we care about working conditions at a non-Apple factory?

Re:Wait...

[tooyoung]

Ah, I can answer my own question - Samsung makes some parts for Apple. I see what you're doing. Those slimy bastards.

Re:Wait...

[mug funky]

I suspect it's an attempt to counter the sudden rash of negative op-eds that Apple has been subject to since the iPhone 5 launch date came and went.

Looks like patent infringement to me

[bhcompy]

I mean, Apple invented near slave labor conditions in China to build iProducts. Pretty sure Apple should take them to court for infringing on the "method of using Chinese for slave labor to build electronic devices while also increasing the suicide rate" patent

Re:Looks like patent infringement to me

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty sure slave labor in China predates the iPhone.

Re:Looks like patent infringement to me

[c0lo]

I mean, Apple invented near slave labor conditions in China to build iProducts. Pretty sure Apple should take them to court for infringing on the "method of using Chinese for slave labor to build electronic devices while also increasing the suicide rate" patent

Dam'd if Samsung does it, dam'd if it doesn't.

You see, Apple was also the first to look into the working conditions and do something to improve them; highly likely they also patented this as well.
I'd say Samsung is better not to do anything about it: it will infringe on only one Apple's patent instead of two (additionally to whatever benefits slave labor already provides).

Re:Looks like patent infringement to me

[peppepz]

You see, Apple was also the first to look into the working conditions and do something to improve them;

No, they started doing "something" only after the bad press that they got for the horrible working conditions they took advantage of for years (and the bad press they got was just a fraction of what they deserved - we even had reparatory articles here on slashdot, such as "can you really build anything without exploiting slavery?"). What they were doing before that, was building spaceship - shaped campuses for their american employees while their chinese ones worked in exploding factories.

Re:Looks like patent infringement to me

[gnasher719]

No, they started doing "something" only after the bad press that they got for the horrible working conditions they took advantage of for years (and the bad press they got was just a fraction of what they deserved - we even had reparatory articles here on slashdot, such as "can you really build anything without exploiting slavery?").

Actually, Apple had been auditing its suppliers, checking up on working conditions, reporting publicly on the number of underage employees they found, and cancelling contracts with some companies, since 2007. Contrary to that, according to Samsung there is "no evidence" that companies working for Samsung employed anyone underage. The only logical explanation is that Apple was looking a lot harder for problems, while Samsung is working hard to look away.

Re:Looks like patent infringement to me

[peppepz]

Since iPad factories were still exploding (repeatedly) as late as December 2011, something must haven't worked well with Apple's checks.

Re:Looks like patent infringement to me

[doesnothingwell]

iSlave it's the user and the assembler.

Pathetic

[grumpyman]

They should deploy minimum wage and laws on safe work conditions so that employer cannot exploit their situations.

Re:Pathetic

[grumpyman]

Dude check my links above : )

Common

[Anonymous Coward]

I came here just to say this. At one factory where I worked 12 hour days seven days a week with three days off was the normal schedule. They made armored military vehicles for the US Army, so most of the time people were walking around for parts or welding in odd positions.

The trucking fleet worked the legal maximum to save money: 14 hours a day six days a week.

Equipment costs more than the people that run them, so the equipment keeps going whether the workers are fatigued or not.

Re:Common

[Taco Cowboy]

For a normal month of 30 days, you work 3 X 7-day-work-3-day-off shifts

Re:Common

[Digital Vomit]

At one factory where I worked 12 hour days seven days a week with three days off was the normal schedule.

The trucking fleet worked the legal maximum to save money: 14 hours a day six days a week.

What's sad is that there are business owners who actually think this sort of scheduling *increases* productivity when we have a hundred years of science that says otherwise.

Wait a sec...

[epp_b]

Is it just me or does "assembling camera lenses" (among other things) sound like something that could be mechanized? I mean, it's not like the lens needs to be different from phone to phone and I'm sure the same could be said for many other parts.

I'm not trying to say that these people should be put out of a job, but wouldn't it be better if some of them could have a lot more job satisfaction from better, more interesting work, with real responsibilities, where they are more than just assembly monkeys? ...and then use that to build a better economic system for themselves where a lot more people can have more rewarding careers?

Re:Wait a sec...

[ppanon]

I suspect it's not so much the machine as sourcing the power to run the lights. It might be better now that you can use LEDs with a lower power drain rather than back when you had to use incandescents. The other thing is that you wouldn't need just traffic lights, you would also need cameras so that people are aware that if they speed through the construction zone and somebody gets hurt as a result, that there will be a record of which car sped through.

You could probably get an electrician to pull the power out of the streets lighting, but then you would need to pay rates for a skill tradesman for a good chunk of a day, plus transit between sites if he moved between sites in an area to maximize use of his time. You would also need to have the electrician disconnect the equipment at night for it to be put away so that it wouldn't be stolen or so that some idiot passerby doesn't electrocute themselves and sue the city/county/contractor. When conditions/road space allow, you get two trucks with those large moving bulb/LED arrrows that are powered by large solar panels and truck batteries. In the peak summer construction season, it's probably just cheaper to pay the lowest wage you can get away with for two people with signs rather than buy some extra trucks that would sit idle for 4/5 of the year. You can find something else for those sign carriers to do during the winter, or they can go back to school.

Re:Wait a sec...

[wienerschnizzel]

It's already happening

Re:Wait a sec...

[TheRaven64]

The main issue is flexibility. A largely human-operated factory has a higher operating cost than a mostly automated one, but it's much faster to make changes to the product. This is really important in markets like mobile phones, where a product is often produced for under a year, often under six months. By the time you've set up an automated factory, the product is almost EOL, and it won't be produced for long enough to recoup your initial investment. This is starting to change, as companies like Foxconn are investing a lot in more flexible robots that will let them 'retool' the factors almost entirely in software.

Alternatives

[humanrev]

Yes, it all sounds very crap to work there. But what are the alternatives?

1) The human workers are replaced by robots - this is unlikely to happen since human labor in China is so plentiful and desperate as to make it actually cheaper to "run" humans than robots. But even if it did eventually happen, you'd end up with a whole lot of people without work (and all the associated problems this creates). Menial factory work at least gives them something to do, even if their lives exist solely for someone else's profit.

2) Improve conditions, reasonable work hours, etc - sounds great, except that if one factory does this, another factory will advertise how they haven't, and so businesses will go to the other factory as they wouldn't have to deal with the reduced output and increased costs of having to treat humans like... well, humans.

3) Improvement of conditions, reasonable work hours via Government mandate - so the factories don't have any choice now and are forced to treat people like they should (more or less). Great, except that this will rise the cost of the products created and the costs will naturally be passed onto consumers in first-world countries. The electronics we buy are as cheap as they are precisely in a large part due to the slave work done in countries far away from us. Would people complain if prices went up as conditions in said countries improved? Damn right they would, unfortunately.

So what do you do? You could buy local, or at least try to. Sometimes that works, but in most cases it's not even possible, and odds are you'll find components that were sourced from the less desirable factories anyway. You can't win, short of abandoning almost all forms of modern electronic equipment. There simply isn't enough pressure to change the statue quo.

Re:Alternatives

[silentcoder]

>Would people complain if prices went up as conditions in said countries improved? Damn right they would, unfortunately.

Not so sure, a survey among apple customers found that 90% of them said they would happily pay 10% more for an apple product if they could get a written guarantee that, that entire 10% would be given to the factory workers.
If apple added a dollar to the price of every iphone - with a guarantee that it would go to a factory worker as a whole - that dollar would probably double their income per hour.

The truth is that low labour cost is really not so needed. A study calculated that for every 30 dollars apple spends per iphone -only 1 dollar actually pays labour costs in manufacturing. It's one 1/30th of the cost - if you cut the margin on an iphone by just 1/30th you could pay the workers double what they earn now. That cannot be a major price for the executives to bear now can it ?

So it's not like improving this would require the prices to go up - but even if it did - it seems most consumers have already said they would be happy to pay more to make it better. Understandably - we would want guarantees. Spending an extra 20 dollars per phone if it goes into the hands of the already-rich apple executives will piss us off. Spending an extra 20 dollars if it goes directly to the factory workers would make us feel GOOD.
It would be charity that actually DOES uplift people and buy them a chance at a better life. The kind even most rightwingers actually rather like.

Re:Alternatives

[Noughmad]

a survey among apple customers found that 90% of them said they would happily pay 10% more for an apple product if they could get a written guarantee that, that entire 10% would be given to the factory workers.

Emphasized that for you.

Re:Alternatives

[silentcoder]

Okay, so some of them wouldn't actually do it ? Have you got any evidence for how many ?

Any reason to believe it's not enough ?

What if it was voluntary ?
Down here KFC has a program where you can voluntarily donate an extra R2 with your meal which gets given to a hunger charity (that's about 10% of a typical meal).

So if Apple gave you this as an OPTION - you don't HAVE to pay the extra 20%, but if you do - they guarantee it will be paid to the workers who worked on your device - how many people would opt-in ?
I would. Maybe not 90%, but maybe enough to make a tangible difference ?

Do you have ANY evidence to suggest otherwise ?

What job do you prefer?

[DeltaQH]

Assemblling 200 lenses per day of flipping 200 burgers per day? Which one is better for the country?

Re:What job do you prefer?

[dalias]

How about flipping 200 McMansions per day?

Re:What job do you prefer?

[DeltaQH]

That would be far better, but I dont such a job will be easy to get

Re:Apple

[__aaltlg1547]

The real reason for the rounded corners: So workers can't slash their wrists with an iPad.

Inverse Democracy

[mug funky]

i wish inverse democracy worked - in the sense that the act of voting determines the quality of the candidates, where in forward democracy the quality of the candidate determines the act of voting.

we could dream up a head of state that didn't suck!

Re:Inverse Democracy

[Anonymous Coward]

i wish inverse democracy worked - in the sense that the act of voting determines the quality of the candidates

It does, if you don't vote for the lesser evil. It is when people start talking about "strategic voting" instead of voting what you actually believe in regardless of outcome that the democracy goes to hell.
A vote for something you don't believe in is worse than not voting at all.

Re:Inverse Democracy

[TheRaven64]

And it takes a surprisingly small number of minority votes to change a candidate's opinion. The difference between the two front runners in a lot of elections is well under 10%, often under 1%. If 2% of the population vote for a single issue candidate, then next time around one or both candidates will realise that they can get an extra 2% of the vote by adopting those policies and that would be enough to swing the election. Unfortunately, in the USA, these issues tend to be things like abortion and gay marriage, not things that actually affect most people.

Re:Inverse Democracy

[sjames]

These days, if you don't vote for the lesser evil, you don't vote.

Re:Inverse Democracy

[Ixitar]

I am voting for Cthulhu for President. Why vote for a lesser evil?

*duck* ... I am sorry, but it had to be said!

Re:Inverse Democracy

[frank_adrian314159]

I am sorry, but it had to be said!

No, it didn't...

Re:Before anyone says it

[mug funky]

yep! it's just that robots don't have a union.

Bring on the lawyers

[mdes]

Haven't Apple already patented those work conditions?

Quick quick, sue Samsung!

What do we expect? Quite a lot now.

[SuperKendall]

what do you expect? Its a factory assembly job with very low entry requirements

Should we not expect regular inspections paid for by Samsung?

Should we not expect wage increases for the workers working on Samsung products, subsidized by Samsung?

Should we not expect Samsung demand reduced working hours of workers assembling Samsung gear?

Should we not expect Samsung issue a supplier responsibility statement with regular reports on progress - even if not believed at least something to hold them to?

All of these are things Apple has done with FoxConn. So it seems pretty obvious that since so many have carefully poured over Apple's actions in this regard, that it is the new standard for what we should expect for companies assembling things in China. We owe the Chinese workers at least that level of effort to make things better.

if you're any good, you will have a job

[Chirs]

I know a lot of people who got the engineering degree because they thought it would pay well, not because they were suited to it or found it at all interesting. They were generally not very good.

kids with jobs!

[dAzED1]

FTFA: "At least 3 factoriesâ"TSMD, SEHZ, and SSKMTâ"have been discovered hiring workers under 18 years of age"

Um...so? I was working at the age of 14, and had a normal non-farm job at the age of 16 (worked at a grocery store). Just because we don't expect people to be anything other than helpless children until age 26 or so these days, doesn't mean that less than 26 years ago teens had jobs. And while yes, it wasn't until I was 19 that I worked at a factory, it really didn't kill me. For serious.

Re:kids with jobs!

[jeko]

Hey Farm Boy,

You and I probably have similar blue-collar backgrounds and work histories, and I have the scars on my back and face to prove it. We're not talking about kids there feeding the goats and collecting eggs. We're not talking about the double-bit ax I was handed at eight years old. We're talking situations closer to ones we had in America, where we sent small children into coal mines because it was cheaper to dig exploratory tunnels that could only fit little kids instead of a full-grown man. A lot of those little boys didn't make it out when their makeshift tunnels collapsed on them. Underage labor in China doesn't mean we sent the kid out under the Texas sun to clear the field. Underage labor in China is a lot more "Oliver Twist" than "The Waltons."

But let's consider your experience. Just because you and I have had hardscrabble lives, does that mean it was right, or does that mean we think our kids should follow in our footsteps? My grandfather never finished grade school. My father had a tractor roll over on him and shatter his leg in several places. He walked with a noticable limp for the rest of his life because of a lack of proper medical care. I can tell you in exquisite detail what blood and bone tastes like and what a shot fired in anger at your head sounds like as it whizzes by.

Sure, we're all badasses here. But is this what we want for our kids? I got a handful of my own, and if my boys went their entire lives without making a fist and meaning it, that would suit me just fine.

Maybe it was the time I spent as a teacher, maybe it the result of being a father for so long, but I find my paternal insticts grow as I get older. Little kids, whether they're mine or not, are little kids. I don't wanna hear about kids in China being worked to death in God-forsaken pits any more than I'd like to hear about the same being done to mine.

Re:kids with jobs!

[microTodd]

I really wish I had mod points...this is seriously one of the best slashdot posts I've ever read.

Re:kids with jobs!

[Bigby]

Good post. But a 16 yr old working on phones in a Samsung factory more closely resembles a 16 yr old farmer than a 16 yr old coal miner.

China Labor Watch

[DNS-and-BIND]

What kind of "China Labor Watch" would they be if they reported everything was OK? They have an incentive to report bad news, and spin everything in a negative direction. For all we know, they could be like NPR and think they don't even need evidence, engaging in outright fabrication. And why not? It supports their pre-existing mental state. "We didn't think that he was lying to us and to audiences about the details of his story."

Hey, I'm not saying Chinese factories are heaven. Even in America, factories that are unionized and obey every OSHA rule are still not particularly pleasant places to work. But the "big name" factories in China have the best working conditions, hands down. I've been to the little ones and they can be hell. If the boss thinks of himself as father to the workers, the small factories can be quite nice. But when he thinks of himself as the only smart person in the company, and the workers as reprehensible (think of it like the way liberals consider middle Americans), things can get bad. Come on, this China Labor Watch isn't going after the bad factories. It's just going after the big names to get publicity for itself. If they were actually interested in fixing things, they'd have no trouble swinging a 2x4 in China and hitting several factories that need to be exposed. But they're not interested in that, eh?

Re:What do we expect? Quite a lot now.

[c0lo]

Should we not expect ... XYZ... paid for by Samsung?

All of these are things Apple has done with FoxConn.

If Samsung would do the same, won't it risk suits of... ripping off what Apple did?

</grin>

Re:What do we expect? Quite a lot now.

[SuperKendall]

Yes, would you mind if they copied Apple for an altruistic reason for once?

The Alternatives

[jeko]

Menial factory work at least gives them something to do, even if their lives exist solely for someone else's profit.

Boom. There. Right there. There's your problem. If you're a fellow American, if you're a fellow member of Western Civilization, how does that not offend you to your core? "Their lives exist solely for someone else's profit" is the working definition of slavery. How can you possibly find this to be an acceptable situation?

Improvement of conditions, reasonable work hours via Government mandate

Which is how we ended child labor and instituted the 40 hour work week in this country, BTW...

Great, except that this will rise the cost of the products created and the costs will naturally be passed onto consumers in first-world countries.

Common misconception. Prices are set not by what the costs of production are but by what the market will bear. Ever hear a company say, "Our costs allow us to make a 300% markup, but we felt that amount of profit was unconscionable, so we marked the price down..."?Rising production costs don't get passed on to the consumer because the price is already set at the maximum the market will allow.

The electronics we buy are as cheap as they are precisely in a large part due to the slave work done in countries far away from us. Would people complain if prices went up as conditions in said countries improved? Damn right they would, unfortunately.

God Help Us, then let them complain. Let's call this the "Papa John" principle. When Papa John complained last month that providing his workers with healthcare would cost an extra quarter per pizza, the first thing that came to my mind was "Cool. You mean I can ensure my pizza guy doesn't have tuberculosis for an extra quarter? What can we get those poor guys if I kick in fifty cents?"

Seriously, if I pay an extra 20 bucks for my iPhone, I can eliminate slavery in China? Good grief. Bill me. If I kick in $40, can I free the North Koreans too?

Re:The Alternatives

[subreality]

If you're a fellow American, if you're a fellow member of Western Civilization, how does that not offend you to your core? "Their lives exist solely for someone else's profit" is the working definition of slavery. How can you possibly find this to be an acceptable situation?

Americans live to work, not work to live. In our own country we only get two to three weeks off a year, work relatively long hours (40 hours a week is considered a bare minimum slacker level, compared to most of the rest of western civilization where it's considered working yourself to death, let alone the 60-80 hours that MANY Americans have to work), and are completely dependent on staying employed lest we have no health coverage, yet we have poor job security even when we're being good little wage slaves.

That's how it is for lower and most middle class Americans; the upper-middle class at least has some savings to give themselves some safety net, but it's pretty much just how life is for the proverbial 99%.

Compare this to the Tianjin workers in TFA. It's different in degree, but that's not shocking when comparing a thoroughly post-industrialized nation with a developing one.

I'm not saying the situation is acceptable in either case. I'm just not surprised that people aren't outraged when it's not that fundamentally different from the conditions at home.

Re:The Alternatives

[humanrev]

Boom. There. Right there. There's your problem. If you're a fellow American, if you're a fellow member of Western Civilization, how does that not offend you to your core? "Their lives exist solely for someone else's profit" is the working definition of slavery. How can you possibly find this to be an acceptable situation?

Well I'm a fellow Australia actually, but that's still western so it's all good. Anyway, yet it does offend me (the bit about people being slaves, not the bit about being Australian). Now I don't possibly think this is an acceptable situation. But on my own, I am completely powerless to do anything about it because I simply don't have the power or leverage to make things better on a grand scale.

All I can do is follow my moral code, try to be consistent and not hypocritical with my actions, and encourage others (without being an annoying zealot) when asked why I think the way I do. It's all any of us can do really.

Re:The Alternatives

[TheRaven64]

Seriously, if I pay an extra 20 bucks for my iPhone, I can eliminate slavery in China? Good grief. Bill me. If I kick in $40, can I free the North Koreans too?

There was an article a few months back where an Apple spokesdroid said it would cost, I believe, an extra $35 if the iPhone were made in the USA, with US employment and environmental laws applying to the factory. We're talking under a 10% increase in price on a piece of consumer electronics, but that's ignoring the fact that a great many of the components would still be made in China. I wouldn't be surprised if the cost were closer to 25% more at the end. That's fine for luxury goods like the iPhone, but what happens when the same increase applies to essentials? A lot of people in the USA could not afford a 25% increase in the cost of, for example, clothing. The typical fix for this is to put up the minimum wage by 25%, but that then means that the cost of any goods or services produced primarily by people making minimum wage goes up.

It would be nice if there were some quick fix that could solve this, but unfortunately it's something that has to happen gradually. The problem is that our elected representatives are not doing the things that would start the process, and China won't because the ruling class is terrified of a large middle class.

Re:The Alternatives

[udachny]

"Their lives exist solely for someone else's profit" is the working definition of slavery

- nonsense. Nobody forces people to work in any particular place for anybody. In China, less of all, people save their money and start their own businesses easier than in most places.

If the workers end up at a factory, that means that was the best situation they found for themselves, they absolutely should be grateful that the factory exists, so they found the employer who is giving them the most of what they can get.

The employer doesn't force them to work for him, he is making money for himself and in the process he creates jobs that some people decide to bid their labour for. People end up working in places that serve them best.

It's the government that can enslave you, a company cannot. Government forces you to pay income taxes, company pays you money for your labour - a voluntary, equitable exchange.

Which is how we ended child labor and instituted the 40 hour work week in this country, BTW.

- child labour, 40 hour work week, everything, it couldn't be mandated, it couldn't be regulated for, it couldn't be decreed by any government on this planet ever. It only happened as a result of raised productivity of the workers, as the capital was applied to create (acquire) the necessary tools and infrastructure and education for the workers, so that they could be more productive.

Only a productive worker can get more than somebody who is just a subsistence farmer. A subsistence farmer maybe feeds himself. A productive worker is a worker that has the necessary capital applied to his labour, so that he can produce for many more people than just himself. ONLY under those circumstances it is possible to reduce the work hours, to get rid of child labour, etc.

None of if it was ever possible on the face of this Earth without free market capitalism, without capital, without people managing the resources efficiently: land, capital, labour.

A bunch of labourers without capital are only surviving on subsistence level. When somebody saves enough capital and uses it as an investment to make money, uses it to create or acquire tools to make labour more efficient, that's when the workers become more productive, which eventually allows the workers to work much less while producing much more.

The best case scenario of-course is to get rid of all employees and still have production that satisfies the market demand. The best advice to any businessman is NOT to hire people, to get rid of as many employees as possible if it can be done without reducing efficiency.

Efficiency is the key, the goal is not the jobs, the goal is products and services that we want. Maximizing efficiency is the goal so that everything we want could be done without human labour at all. 40 hour work week 100 years ago... if the gov't didn't hack the Constitution and the Republic and didn't start growing the way it did, if it was still constrained by the law (Constitution), if it wasn't allowed to go above its authority with respect to money, interest rates, all the socialist and fascist agenda (health care, insurance, education, energy, business and labour regulations, environmental regulations, everything), then today people maybe could work 3 days a week for just 5 hours a day because their productivity would have been so high, they could produce everything that the market wanted in that time.

Instead the gov't stepped in, took the wealth created by the free market capitalism and destroyed that wealth while destroying the idea of raising efficiency and prevented increase of the standard of living.

The current depression is the market trying to correct all the mistakes that the people, the gov't have done over the last 100 years of activity, taxing income, subsidizing individuals and businesses, creating monopolies, everything that gov't does. The gov't sees this cleansing process as something that must be prevented, and because of it

Re:The Alternatives

[udachny]

Of-course profits must be maximized, and in case when maximizing profits is done by maximizing efficiency, that's what is going to be done, which is what the free market leads to.

The factories in China are hiring people because that's the way to maximize efficiency if you are in China right now. It's to have some amount of capital that is necessary to buy best tools, but also to hire people, because it is STILL efficient to hire people in China unlike in America and most of the other places on this planet. It's inefficient to hire Americans, very inefficient and dangerous. Again, the best advice for any American who is in business is to minimize the number of people he employs, not to hire any new employees at all and to look for other ways of running business.

Not hiring Americans, outsourcing to China is one way to do it.

Re:The Alternatives

[udachny]

Made awesome umbrellas. Very efficient. But they were so efficient, their umbrellas were so good, nobody had to buy more than one umbrella for many many years.

- it's up to the market to decide whether it wants sturdy old umbrellas that never break or cheap flashy new umbrellas every year. Whatever the market decides is by definition what it wants.

And staying in the US, buying up politicians is another way. Don't let the libertarians tell you that it's somehow wrong "ethnically" or "economically". What the hell does that matter to a business? The only thing that matters to a business is profits

- I am not arguing that once the gov't is so big and powerful that it can keep stealing individual liberties it is then beneficial to buy that power from gov't.

Libertarians are correct that this power shouldn't be in the hands of the politicians in the first place, that's what Constitution was set up to do - to prevent politicians from gaining power they weren't supposed to have. This constraint has failed.

Re:The Alternatives

[kaatochacha]

I agree: Pay extra and finance better conditions. I make my attempt by buying products made in the US, but any 1st world produced item counts in my book as equal.
What's really strange is, I'm politically conservative. My politically self-identifying liberal friends say the same thing you do: "Oh, i'd pay more for guaranteed rights for those who make the items", but they're always the first to bottom dollar, buy from Amazon instead of a local shop, brand shop regardless of quality, pay no attention at all to country of origin, etc.-then consider me stupid of overpaying.
In theory, they agree. In practice, they do completely the opposite. I"m assuming most surveys on consumer price shopping bear this out.

Re:The Alternatives

[kaatochacha]

Yes, because that has worked so well in the past.
Let me remind you, like in revolutionary France, the people shouting "Kill these fuckers now before it's too late" are usually killed themselves in the second wave of purges

Re:The Alternatives

[kaatochacha]

If I had mod points, up you would go. This is precisely what I wish more people would do.

Re:The Alternatives

[ArsonSmith]

who in the US "has" to work 60-80 hours for a modest life style?

modest 2 bedroom apartment in decent lower cost city $1000mo. grocery bills for family of 3 $800mo. Used car $200mo including gas. 4 weeks times 40 hours = 160hrs

So $12.50hr after taxes will will support a family of 3-4. A second income could help that. The average in the US is nearly double that.

It's the life style not the income that's the problem.

Re:The Alternatives

[subreality]

Sure, you can squeak by on minimum wage if you're very frugal. However, that doesn't include things like saving for retirement, putting the kids through college, health care, etc.

In higher wage jobs, many people are working long hours not by choice, but because their employers are demanding it.

Re:The Alternatives

[ArsonSmith]

using a gun? I've been asked to work over time. After it got excessive, I left. Quite simple. Just got another job. The new one payed more and had less overtime.

Re:The Alternatives

[Sardaukar86]

The fact is that every rich person feels a poor person is a disposable slave. No rich fuck gives a shit if you even have a weekend off now.

KILL THESE FUCKERS NOW BEFORE ITS TOO LATE

Of course, your purity would shine through even if you found yourself head of a company turning over $200 million a year, right?

I'd like to think *my own* purity would shine through too, but the truth is that money and power typically corrupt human beings. One need only review history for concrete examples.

Humanity, as it is right now, is pretty ugly. Of course, that's our choice...

Re:What do we expect? Quite a lot now.

[c0lo]

Yes, would you mind if they copied Apple for an altruistic reason for once?

What?!? This is an attack to free market, freedom and other high values in someone's constitution! That's commie think!!

</very_large_grin> (warning: if you continue down this path, I'll feel compelled to issue a whooosh! ticket)

Are you sure?

[Taco Cowboy]

I worked construction for a few summers after high school -- 12 hour shifts weren't uncommon (on my feet the whole time)

Come again, buddy??
 
I worked in construction sites every summer during my college years, for I desperately needed money to pay for books and food and shelter
 
From scaffolding to steel framing high rises, never did I have to be on my feet for the entire 12 hour shift
 
Which job were you in, buddy?

Re:Are you sure?

[hawguy]

I worked construction for a few summers after high school -- 12 hour shifts weren't uncommon (on my feet the whole time)

Come again, buddy??

I worked in construction sites every summer during my college years, for I desperately needed money to pay for books and food and shelter

From scaffolding to steel framing high rises, never did I have to be on my feet for the entire 12 hour shift

Which job were you in, buddy?

I worked for a heavy construction company, primarily doing road construction - doing things like shoveling asphalt that fell out of the paver, raking down stone to level it, pressure washing mud off the heavy equipment before loading it for transport to another job site, directing trucks to dump their load where it was needed, subbing in for flagman when needed, etc. About the only time I got to sit down was when I had to drive to pick up parts or, when I was lucky, get a cushy job escorting heavy/wide loads.

Re:Are you sure?

[rtb61]

That's normally referred to as civil works, a distinction because of the lack of skills required in labour. Construction work is separate due to the skills required even in labouring work. I have done 12 hour shifts on a production like, fortunately with an agile mind and vivid imagination, it was easy to park my body on the task at hand whilst my mind was elsewhere. Still it is easy based upon my experience to see where RSI comes from and it logical long term consequences upon people who lack the intellectual ability to move on. That lack of intellect should not be a reason to exploit, leave the in a dead end position which they will not be able to sustain till retirement and to give them no real future.

We is it contrary to right wing bullshit, those that work the hardest in the most undesirable jobs get paid the least and those that put in the least real effort in the most desirable jobs get paid the most. A fair and honest society recognises this and makes an adjustment, an inherently insane, deceitful and dishonest society simply exploits the situation. Turns human beings into drones working in poverty, to be ruthlessly exploited unto death.

What ever happened to the lie about increased productivity and automation, it would seem the benefits only got shared amongst the top psychopathic 1% and the rest simply got screwed over. It's time to start nailing the 1% and teach them a thing or two about being ruthlessly exploited.

Re:Are you sure?

[codman1]

"lack the intellectual ability to move on" Who said they lack the intellectual capacity, I don't think there are that many jobs that pay as well as these assembly jobs. They get paid the going rate or above it, and have subsidised housing and food. Without these job many would be in small towns farming earning even less and in poorer working conditions.

Re:Are you sure?

[udachny]

I have made a comment that is contrary to yours, I don't want to repeat what I said there.

Here I'll just add something on this:

What ever happened to the lie about increased productivity and automation, it would seem the benefits only got shared amongst the top psychopathic 1% and the rest simply got screwed over. It's time to start nailing the 1% and teach them a thing or two about being ruthlessly exploited.

- the increase in productivity was absolutely real. The people working 40 hour weeks instead of working all the time in the fields just for subsistence was the increase in productivity due to the capital that was applied to their labour.

You are asking: "what happened?"

If that is a true question, then I have the answer for you. What happened was that the increased productivity due to the free market capitalism was negated by the growing government, which saw the opportunity to steal all that productivity. Politicians want power and in supposed 'democracy' (it should be a Republic, where minority of people get to vote, not majority), bread and circuses mentality allows the worst power hungry liars and con men to be elected into the political offices. They promise everything for nothing and they get elected. When they do get elected, they end up growing the government, at some point the growth of gov't is beyond what the economy can bear. The tipping point was way back in the fifties and sixties, which resulted in the problems that were experienced in the seventies, when Nixon had to default on the dollar to allow the government growth without actually directly increasing taxes, because the economy couldn't afford anymore taxes.

Of-course it started 100 years ago, with that traitor to the Constitution and the Republic, Theodore Roosevelt. Since then pretty much everybody (except for Harding) behaved in the same manner, the government kept growing and the productivity was stolen, negated by the ever growing gov't system, ever growing corruption.

Government is corruption, because it has the power to steal individual liberties and then sell them to the highest bidder. The Constitution was the barrier to that, so they abandoned it and the courts and all branches of gov't participate together in it, it's a well oiled machine of corruption.

To blame 1% is the cop-out, the blame is with the people who again, fell for this bread and circuses promise of so called 'fairness', basically class envy.

Yes, there are people rich and poor, it will always be the case, it will never go away. In the free market capitalist system the rich are those who give people the best product at the lowest price. In the government system it's those, who have the most and the best government connections.

Guess what's better for the 99%, the first system or the second? We had the second system in the USSR, I am grateful that it collapsed. USA is moving that direction, too bad.

As to the 1%, most of the production moved out of USA, so you are left with the 99% producing almost nothing, so what do you care about the 1%? They produce plenty somewhere else, you are still getting the benefit of that production subsidized by foreign governments willing to rob their own people with inflation to prop up US consumer. Eventually this music will stop, you won't have the capital of the 1%, because real capital is production capacity, not paper currency.

If paper currency was the answer, Zimbabwe, USSR, Weimar republic, etc. (100 examples in 150 years), would have prospered. Instead they collapsed.

The capital is the necessary instrument in order to increase productivity, the efficiency of production, because capital buys or makes (or is) the tools that are applied to labour. This is what makes the 99% productive - capital. Capital cannot be stolen, it cannot be printed, it must be saved. If it's stolen, then it's a very temporary infusion. If it's printed, it's the same as st

Re:Are you sure?

[moeinvt]

"A fair and honest society recognises this and makes an adjustment,"

Men with guns stealing from people, paying themselves exorbitant salaries and benefits, handing out favors to their rich and well connected friends, and then throwing some table scraps to the poor?

There will ALWAYS be wealth inequality, but things like hard work, raw talent and innovation in a competitive marketplace should be what garners disproportionate wealth. In the contemporary USA, government-granted special privileges, monetary manipulation, handouts and subsidies drive wealth inequality. It's no coincidence that the DEGREE of wealth inequality has grown just as government has grown.

Monetary manipulation is probably the most insidious driver of wealth inequality. Since the inception of the Federal Reserve system, we've had a century of relentless monetary expansion and price inflation. Productivity growth should naturally result in price deflation. Labor could then enjoy some of the gains by an increase in their real wages and savers would be rewarded with more purchasing power. The Fed STEALS this wealth.

The fractional reserve banking system is another driver of wealth inequality because banks get the privilege of manipulating the money supply. For anyone else, this is called "counterfeiting".

Forget the 99% vs. 1% bullshit. There is a big difference between people who EARN their wealth by real economic activity and people who "accumulate" wealth based on government sanctioned special privileges.

Without the central planners in the government and The Fed, wealth inequality never would have grown to such ridiculous proportions.

Re:Are you sure?

[pnutjam]

If the government stole all that productivity why are all the rich politicians businessmen? The ones stealing the productivity are the capitol class.

You can't get a leg up without some sort of capital, working hard doesn't do shit for you.

Re:Are you sure?

[pnutjam]

Conservatives love to rant about the failure of a centrally planned economy and the success of our market driven economy. Meanwhile we have the Fed manipulating our economy, Business interest groups like the chamber of commerce manipulating our laws, and every municipality and state throwing money at corporations to "bring them jobs".

Doesn't seem so free market to me... It looks more and more like fascism with a tiny dose of Libertarianism mixed in...
probably need a new name... Fascialarianism?

Re:Are you sure?

[rtb61]

The smallest government is a monarchy. All your crap is just that crap, delusional right wing thinking. Big government is for once and for all, a government of the people, by the people and for the people, it's as big as it can get because it involves all the people. Last time we had small government, we cut off the heads because they refused to accept democracy, let's not go back there again.

Re:Are you sure?

[rtb61]

'Erm yeah' record corporate profits, you really pay now attention at all to facts facts and just rant libertarian talking points. Anyone who doesn't understand that economics for the last half century has largely be PR=B$ and market distortions, well, there is just no hope for them.

Re:Are you sure?

[udachny]

Oh yeah? So are you willing to have a tax code that prevents people who became wealthy without 'leg up' by working hard from paying income taxes?

Why are politicians rich? At least early on they had politicians that were rich PRIOR getting to politics, nowadays people go to politics to become rich. Ask Gingrich and Pelosi, etc.

Re:Are you sure?

[khallow]

why are all the rich politicians businessmen

A large number of those so-called "businessmen" are actually heirs to considerable fortunes such as the Kennedys, Kerry (by marriage), and the Rockefellers. It's an easy career path, if you have the right relatives.

And it's worth noting that a lot of those rich politicians have no business experience whatsoever. Some politicians that have made good income from book deals. For example, Obama and Gingrich. Some politicians have made good income from "lucky" stock or real estate deals such as the Clintons and Pelosi. Some make good money from speaking engagements (ex-presidents from Reagan on up).

Re:Are you sure?

[khallow]

That's normally referred to as civil works, a distinction because of the lack of skills required in labour.

By who? Googling around, it seems that the physical products of civil engineering is the only thing actually called "civil works" out there.

What ever happened to the lie about increased productivity and automation, it would seem the benefits only got shared amongst the top psychopathic 1% and the rest simply got screwed over. It's time to start nailing the 1% and teach them a thing or two about being ruthlessly exploited.

And who's going to hire you after we fuck over the people who hire people? I'm not. That's for sure. There's all this take of comeuppance. There's no obvious awareness of reality. Work is just not that valuable any more. And the more lunatics such as yourself drive away those people who create stuff and employ people, the worse it'll get.

I'll make an easy prediction. At no point in the rest of your life, will society ever progress towards your goals above, no matter if society tries or not. It's an approach with failure inherently built in. And you'll be blaming that mean old 1% all the time for holding you back.

Re:Are you sure?

[rtb61]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_engineering which leads to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Works_Administration. Americans being fonts of dumbing it down of course turned it into heavy construction and to make it easier for you, here look at the pretty pictures https://www.google.com.au/search?num=10&hl=en&safe=off&site=imghp&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1536&bih=724&q=civil+works&oq=civil+works&gs_l=img.3..0l3.1782.3585.0.4120.11.10.0.1.1.1.259.1341.4j2j4.10.0...0.0...1ac.1.UEOhI97LhAk.

Just so you understand everyone is eventually built for the end user, now that's back to the 99%. Currently all that happens is the psychopathic 1% have inserted themselves in there as parasites sucking 30% odd out of everything going on by having bought up all the means of production and creating the illusion of high finance. We build for the 99%, we feed the 99%, we house the 99% etc. Hint, hint, that is why they psychopathic 1% so hate government industry, because it is a continual reminder that we do not need the 1% and that they are an economic waste.

Re:Are you sure?

[khallow]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_engineering which leads to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Works_Administration.

Oh look, linking to stuff that confirms my assertion. Do you even understand how to argue?

Just so you understand everyone is eventually built for the end user, now that's back to the 99%.

100% of people are end-users in some sense. This doesn't distinguish between the so-called 1% and 99% groups.

Hint, hint, that is why they psychopathic 1% so hate government industry, because it is a continual reminder that we do not need the 1% and that they are an economic waste.

And why would the so-called 1% "hate" government industry? It's a great way for up to 50% or so of the economy to jump into their pockets.

Re:Are you sure?

[pnutjam]

Your first sentence is very difficult to parse, but I believe everyone should pay their taxes and the tax code should be structured to take a slightly higher percentage from higher income individuals.

The money in our political system is a disgrace.

Re:Are you sure?

[pnutjam]

If we ran the country like a business the president would make $200 million a year and our votes would be non-binding advice.

Re:Are you sure?

[udachny]

I think you should watch this, it's about 5 minutes.

No, I don't believe that people's incomes should be taxed at all by the way, regardless of how much they make.

Re:Are you sure?

[pnutjam]

Sounds like you have never seen how much money non-profits rake in, it doesn't go to the workers either. Non-profits are a huge scam. also, your video sucks...

I am so tired of listening to conservative radio, it's like watching Nelson in the school yard. It seems like the GOP heard someone say, "Never argue with a moron, they just drag you down to their level and beat you with experience." They thought, "I just need more experience at being a moron!"
Sure enough, you cannot find a more experienced moron outside the GOP. That's some can do attitude!

Re:Are you sure?

[udachny]

The video is of one Peter Schiff, the guy who only predicted and bet against the dot com bubble when everybody was buying into it, the guy who predicted and bet against the housing bubble, when everybody was buying into it, and the guy who is betting against the dollar and bond bubble, and everybody is buying these right now as well. He is an author of multiple books and the founder of a number of companies, which he started alone after working as an investment broker for a large firm for 5 or 6 years after college.

He runs his own online radio show, which is the next step after his decade long first show, called 'unspun'. He employs 150 people in his investment company, now has a bank, has a couple foreign companies because of regulatory environment, especially the Patriot Act preventing him from doing business the way he wants to with foreign customers.

He testified in front of Congress on a number of occasions (so did his father, who is a political prisoner in USA, who testified back in 1968 or 69 in front of Congress, being the only voice against going off the gold standard, predicting that prices of gold would skyrocket and so would inflation, nobody cared).

So when it comes who is 'moron' here, it's not him, it's you, I doubt you have achieved even a tiny fraction of what he has, but in today's Internet world everybody is an on-line hero, isn't that so, pnutjam?

Re:Are you sure?

[pnutjam]

Allow me to defend myself as a tax payer in the top 20% of personal incomes, solidly lower middle class due to my single income family and choice to have children. Fiscally conservative, socially progressive, and politically homeless.

Re:What do we expect? Quite a lot now.

[SuperKendall]

Yes, I got the joke just fine thanks... My own response was a lot less serious before Slashdot commenting ate my own sarcastic closing tag because I forgot to add /code...

12 hours!?!?! dear lord!!

[chris.alex.thomas]

I can remember a time before i got into computers that I had to work in chicken factory, tissue factory and a cardboard factory and in all of those standing up next to a conveyor for 8 or 12 hour shifts with just 30 minutes break and it was the norm, its hard but not overly and doesn't need superhuman powers to do it

So whilst I emphasise with the conditions, its hardly slave labour...plus they are being paid better than most other jobs....so not much to complain about. At least they don't have to smash rocks with a hammer whilst being chained up or threatened with death. That would actually be slave labour

Contract jobs don't count.

[sethstorm]

Not only do you get every single cost dumped onto you, you also get to deal with things without the benefits of a large scale company, or the ability to look beyond the end of the short contract.

Re:Contract jobs don't count.

[Ixitar]

With your own LLC, you also get to put more money away in a tax deferred retirement plan. There are limits on the amount of money that can be put into your 401(k).

You are still paying the costs as an employee, but they are hidden from you and you also have no say in how they are spent.

Re:Contract jobs don't count.

[sethstorm]

That fails to address issues regarding scale, which would wipe out any gains from the LLC end. In addition, it fails to address the restriction that short-term work has on planning for the long-term.

The "hidden" costs are usually not done badly, thus mooting the choice objection. When such are done badly, it shows up in other parts of the company and thus easily avoidable.

Hard to tell

[jandersen]

I find it very hard to ascertain what the facts are when it comes to China. One very big reason is that there are so many groups with an extreme anti-China agenda, who will invent or distort just about any tall tale to support their claims; I don't think I need to dig out any references - they must be well known by now. So can we trust what "Labor rights group China Labor Watch" have to say? I don't know.

So, to me it is back to what seems plausible. That factory workers in China seem to regard their work in the same way as any factory worker in the West does - that seems plausible to me. It is not unlikely that they are expected to work much harder than we are used to - the Chinese I know personally all have an unbelievable work discipline. Just to compare: I've had a British builder do some work on my house; he turned up around 9 am and left around 5 pm after doing some quite decent work. I've recently had a Chinese builder do a similar sort of job, to the same standard; but he didn't leave until around 8 pm. I think it is simply in their culture to work very hard, and what would feel like unreasonable to an American or European may seem quite reasonable to a Chinese.

Re:Before anyone says it

[TheRaven64]

I wonder what happens to the Marxist ideal of workers controlling the means of production when all of the work is done by robots...

Re:Apple

[Compaqt]

That's for the phone itself. The icons are round so the workers inside the phone can't slash their wrists.

Is this Apple? I can't tell.

[erroneus]

Why do I get this feeling it's Apple trying to get some anti-Samsung feelings out there? After all, the iPhone factory stories of suicides and crap like that really got some talk time before. If this is what it was supposed to be, it's weak. Otherwise, I'm not sure what is new or interesting about this story.

Apple workers commit suicide, Apple patent is safe

[ByronHope]

At least the Samsung workers don't need safety nets to stop them committing suicide. Glad to see Samsung is not infringing Apple's patent on suicide inducing labor conditions.

Re:Lol apple at it again

[santax]

Ah I did;t know that foxconn would do it for free... Idiot.

Re:Is this Apple? I can't tell.

[number6x]

Why do I get this feeling it's Apple trying to get some anti-Samsung feelings out there? After all, the iPhone factory stories of suicides and crap like that really got some talk time before. If this is what it was supposed to be, it's weak. Otherwise, I'm not sure what is new or interesting about this story.

It is interesting how many anti-[insert name of current lawsuit foe] stories show up in the media when apple or someone starts to sue a company.

Not to excuse the behavior, but it seems to happen with companies other than apple as well.

Is it really coordinated, or could it be the increased attention of the lawsuit gets journalists to start doing background on the parties involved? Those background research efforts then lead to these stories. Before the apple lawsuit, who outside of South Korea paid much attention to Samsung? This could be a side effect of the lawsuits.

Wait, I just said "journalists to start doing background on the parties involved". Since when do 'journalists' in the technical press do anything other than:

• Cut and paste corporate press releases
• Write opinion pieces
• Get paid to badmouth someone

Journalists in the tech press doing background research! There is about as much chance of that as SCO had in making billions in its lawsuit scam.

The View from the Ground

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm an expat living in China right now. I've worked in hardware startups most of my career but had the unique (and unsought for) experience of managing a Chinese contract manufacturing division in china for about a year.

When I wasn't in China, I found all these labor reports disturbing. Being in China now, however, my perspective is somewhat different. When I first took over management for the division, I thought people worked really long hours but were not very efficient. Thus, I proposed reducing everybody's hours by about 15% but also increasing pay ~10%. To my surprise, the line leaders were very much in opposition.

Like in the States, the payrate increases for overtime pay (1.5X on weekdays, 2X on weekends) and labor force both realizes and capitalizes on this. When you look at the base cost of labor in China, it seems very low but in practice nobody ever pays the base rate. I did some cost analysis and the effective wage rate for Chinese workers is higher for a worker of comparable age and skill as that of a worker in Mexico. You don't manufacture in China now for cheap labor--you manufacture there b/c of the supply chain and the access to cheap capitol.

Other things I found interesting:
(a) the labor force is very young and their education level is very low (some barely graduate high school). college students usually go into the service industry. thus it's hard to find quality labor in manufacturing
(b) very few workers are from the eastern seaboard regions. because of the appreciation in real estate prices, most people native to that region are already quite well off. labor force comes from western provinces like Sichuan and Xian and rural counties where there isn't a lot of industry
(c) thus it's kind of like a migrant work force. young men and women leave their town for a couple years, work their asses off. they save up enough to get married and start a home in their hometown. few stay for the long term. turnover is extremely high, 30% minimum during the new year holidays
(d) as you can imagine, continuity is a problem. maintaining a skilled work force is difficult. one example comes from maintenance bills for machinery. compared to our plant in east europe, for example, maintenance was higher by almost 300%. people would just break stuff because there's a constant stream of newbies

It seems like they should just change the way they pay workers but I notice Chinese businesses like to be flexible. Thus, the lower wage/high overtime structure.

Not saying either I agree with any of this. It's just how it is. Thought you folk might be interested

Re:The View from the Ground

[Ixitar]

I wish I had mod points for you. I am a former expat that did some consulting work in China. You hit the nail on the head.

Re:The View from the Ground

[shutdown -p now]

It's not really about Chinese abusing Chinese. It's about Western companies making a nice profit from using all that cheap labor, but then selling manufactured goods at First World markets where they fetch a much heftier price. Western societies can certainly afford to pay more for their gadget toys.

Re:What do we expect? Quite a lot now.

[c0lo]

Yes, I got the joke just fine thanks... My own response was a lot less serious before Slashdot commenting ate my own sarcastic closing tag because I forgot to add /code...

My apologies... (a typical case of Poe's law being alive and kicking).

Re:Before anyone says it

[arose]

I wonder what happens to the Capitalist (or whoever best fits that ideology) ideal of working your way up if you don't get capital showever on you by fate when increased efficiency makes some workers redundant... wait...

Can't say much for Marxism but in a communistic society (you know, the anarchist one, not the state sized corporation "striving" for communism) there'd be fewer workers controlling the robots, everyone else would be pretty much SOL, just like now, but with no safety nets at all.

Ah, another "John Wayne" conservative...

[jeko]

...and there are precious few of us old school conservatives left who remember "Rio Bravo." If you'd hold a rich man in jail despite deadly opposition because you believe in the Rule of Law, you're a John Wayne conservative.

If you oppose one man monopolizing the water and land rights in town, you're a John Wayne conservative.
If you believe that we all -- even the drunks and the handicapped -- should work together toward a common good, you're a John Wayne conservative.
If you believe even addicts and convicts deserve a second chance, you're a John Wayne conservative.
If you believe Jesus died for our sins and that we're all undeserving of His grace, and that how we treat "the least of these" is how we treat Him, then you're a John Wayne conservative.

The problem is Paul Ryan's GOP thinks you're a pinko socialist.

Go ahead. Walk into a gathering of your fellow faux conservatives and say the following: "I believe that people who commit a crime should go to jail. Lying on a sworn court document is perjury. Any banker who 'robo-signed' documents should be in prison." Let me know how that goes.

Walk into your nearest Assembly of God church and try the following line: "I believe Christians should go, sell all that they have, give to the poor, and follow Him." Follow that up with a suggestion that Christians should spend most of their time among brawlers, whores and thieves (Peter, Mary, Zacchaeus). If you really want to wind them up, try quoting Barbara Ehrenreich describing our Lord as "a wine-guzzling vagrant," which is pretty much a direct quote from how Christ described himself. It's amazing how many of my brethren balk at that blunt and clever turn of phrase, and totally miss the scathing indictment she makes about our lack of Faith.

I spent my little boys years in Huck Finn territory, and I grew up among men with rough hands and hard lives. I spent my Sundays in literal clapboard churches on wooden pews. When the men I grew up with had time for a movie, it was usually John Wayne.

And I cannot reconcile the classic American values found in those movies with the Ebenezer Scrooge beliefs of the modern Republican party.

 

Re:Yes our toys are made by slaves

[Khashishi]

Slaves. I don't think it means what you think it does.

Apply these standards in the U.S.

[aminorex]

I can't count on my fingers and toes the number of months I've worked more than 100 hours overtime -- and I didn't get paid a dime for it. It's what you gotta do if you want to keep up with the H1Bs in tech.

Re:Is this Apple? I can't tell.

[quacking duck]

Beyond Foxconn:Deplorable Working Conditions Characterize Apple’s Entire Supply Chain, released July 27, 2012.

An Investigation of Eight Samsung Factories in China: Is Samsung Infringing Upon Apple’s Patent to Bully Workers?, released September 4, 2012.

But yes, let's chalk this up to a conspiracy theory by Apple perhaps bribing China Labor Watch to tarnish Samsung's good name.

If Samsung (or any company) is in violation of labour laws, who cares who brings it up? Or does it hurt that much now that the shoe being on the other foot?

Re:Before anyone says it roxy

[mug funky]

ED-209!! yes!