Something is very wrong.

[aristide1]

http://gizmodo.com/5544324/tenth-foxcon ... ls-himself

[judge56988]

So long as people want cheap electronic goods, nothing will change.

Chinese newspaper Southern Weekly sent 20-year-old reporter Liu Zhi Yi undercover in Foxconn's factory in Shenzhen, China. For 28 days, he experienced dreadful conditions that the factory's 400,000 employees endure, churning out iPods, iPads, and iPhones for Apple nonstop.

Now I'm not saying that Apple are the only guilty party here but do all those "Lefty trendy types" that go for Apple products know the truth about how they can afford to buy them?

The ONLY reason computers are so affordable nowadays is because the components are made in conditions like this. The same applies to a lot of the cheap clothing and many other products that are available.
Nothing will change unless we stop buying the products.

Is there any difference between these workers and the slaves who picked cotton and sugar cane?

We need to get used to having less "stuff", paying more for it and getting things made in our own countries by our own workers. The era of conspicuous consumption fuelled by easy credit is rapidly coming to an end... ask the Greeks.

[psyopper]

Judge - you are only partially correct. The other problem that needs attention is what I call the investor relations profit margin epidemic.

A companies net worth is based on their number of outstanding shares and the market value of those shares. Traders buy shares in a company when they see growth in a companies profits, which makes sense. That is, until you break it down more specifically - we are talking year over year GROWTH in profits, no just net profit.

If Company A reports a net profit of $1 Billion in 2008 and a net profit of $1 Billion in 2009, they are seen as a "flat growth" company. Purchasing stock in this company nets the investor no extra income year over yea so the investor sells off his stock and buys something more "profitable". With this sell off Company A's net worth goes down because there are fewer outstanding shares selling for less money.

Think about this a little closer. A $1 billion profit just isn't good enough!

Any company that is publicly traded (APPL, MSFT, ...) is looking at this and thinking about how they keep their net profit growing...? Cheaper parts (China), cheaper labor (China), increased pricing (Win7), increased volume (advertising).

Now think about where you and I fit into this regime. These companies want us to purchase as much as we can so their net worth grows, yet they want to pay us as little as they can so their net worth grows. So where does all this extra money come from?

[Redzo]

good point and very well put together psyopper. the wheel is spinning faster and faster. this so called "economy" must go.

[Fayd]

...

the stupidity in this thread is amazing.

first off, the reason this is news is because foxconn is out of the ordinary. this isnt par for the course, even in china.

second, if you've read anything more than these stupid articles about the situation, you'd realize that the reason for poor working conditions in general in china is because china's government wants it that way. they forcibly devalue their own currency, they implemented a caste system in order to keep rural chinese in poverty, to force a long-term low wage market who'd be happy (yes, HAPPY) to get ANY job in the city, even one that pays shit.

third, judge, apple is ALWAYS the most expensive consumer product available. it's not about "how they can afford to buy them", because the end product will be roughly the same price anyways. labor costs involved in production of consumer electronics is one of the low inputs anyways. if you want to blame somebody, blame foxconn for their shitty working conditions, then *maybe* blame apple for not caring about working conditions in their affiliated production facilities. but apple doesn't compete on price, so dont bring that bullshit.

yeah, computers are so affordable because of sweatshop labor. yeah right. that's why most fabs are in places of high economic prosperity...


get the hint. computers and electronic devices are cheap because of economies of scale. even if we paid workers properly, the end costs of said devices wouldnt go up significantly.

Is there any difference between these workers and the slaves who picked cotton and sugar cane?

this pisses me off. in order to be employed by the factory, they have to sign a consent form. and then they can opt out at any given time. while they may "feel" trapped, they aren't. compare to a slave, who can be whipped, raped, killed, without any say in the matter. and if they run away, they run the risk of getting killed.

i think by making this "parallel", you're cheapening the experience of the millions of slaves that WERE brought here to pick cotton and sugarcane.

[judge56988]

...

get the hint. computers and electronic devices are cheap because of economies of scale. even if we paid workers properly, the end costs of said devices wouldnt go up significantly.

Really?
Then tell me why so many companies get stuff made in places like China, Korea, India if it's not because of low costs?
Maybe it's so they can pay to ship materials to these countries from the "fabs in places of high economic prosperity" and then pay more to ship the finished goods back to Europe, Japan and the US.
Then tell me why so many factories that used to manufacture goods in Europe and the US shut down and moved to China, Eastern Europe and similar places?
While you're at it, tell me why most of the call centres are in India instead of, let's say, Detroit or Liverpool? Is it because the customers like the novelty of speaking to someone with a strange accent?
Why did the British ship building industry die? Was it because they could not compete with shipyards in the Far East?
Why is the American car industry on it's Knees?
Cheap labour is the reason. Unless you can give me some other valid reason?

Now the big question - if this economic system is so wonderful, why is the US in debt to China for billions (or is it trillions?) of dollars?
Why is unemployment and bankruptcy going up and up in the West?
What's the endgame going to be? Surely you know? You seem to think you know it all when it comes to economics; after all, everybody else's opinions in this thread are plain stupid according to you.

[Fayd]

...

get the hint. computers and electronic devices are cheap because of economies of scale. even if we paid workers properly, the end costs of said devices wouldnt go up significantly.

Really?
Then tell me why so many companies get stuff made in places like China, Korea, India if it's not because of low costs?
Maybe it's so they can pay to ship materials to these countries from the "fabs in places of high economic prosperity" and then pay more to ship the finished goods back to Europe, Japan and the US.
Then tell me why so many factories that used to manufacture goods in Europe and the US shut down and moved to China, Eastern Europe and similar places?
While you're at it, tell me why most of the call centres are in India instead of, let's say, Detroit or Liverpool? Is it because the customers like the novelty of speaking to someone with a strange accent?
Why did the British ship building industry die? Was it because they could not compete with shipyards in the Far East?
Why is the American car industry on it's Knees?
Cheap labour is the reason. Unless you can give me some other valid reason?

Now the big question - if this economic system is so wonderful, why is the US in debt to China for billions (or is it trillions?) of dollars?
Why is unemployment and bankruptcy going up and up in the West?
What's the endgame going to be? Surely you know? You seem to think you know it all when it comes to economics; after all, everybody else's opinions in this thread are plain stupid according to you.

1: i never said it's not because of low costs of labor. to pursue profit, you cut all unnecessary expenditures. my point was that the end price would not rise significantly. how much do you think the marginal cost of labor is on a single device? each device has maybe a couple minutes max of labor put into it, throughout its entire production cycle. given that each worker that spends time on a device processes a LOT of devices, and each device goes through a LOT of hands, we can generally just aggregate that as 2 minutes of a person's day.

let's say we're building ipods. $200 purchase price. currently, those factory workers are paid 80 cents per hour. (actually it's less than this, but let's just assume.) that's 2.6 cents per device they churn out.

you could double, triple, quadruple their wages and it wouldnt have a significant effect on the end cost of the goods. as for why this doesnt happen... because there's not enough demand for it to happen?

2: the american car industry is fucked by dramatically overpaid labor. unions are a plague upon capitalism. unskilled labor should NOT be paid in excess of what a college educated person is expected to make. it has been made this way because of the decidedly UNcapitalistic union. BUT: it's also fucked because it's just fucked. noone wants to buy american because of a shitty reputation for quality, and a complete lack of inspiration of design.

btw, toyota tmk is the only car manufacturer opening NEW plants in the USA.

3: it's trillions. and it's because of politics. that has little to nothing to do with the underlying economic system. FYI, a government following capitalistic principles should have little to no debt because they have little to no expenditures. as for why our debt keeps climbing, the bulk of it is do to entitlements (government pensions, medicare, social security, etc) and the second contributor is our defense budget. it costs a lot to police the world. as an example, we have more aircraft carriers than the rest of the world combined. and each of ours will probably be worth 2-4 or more than anyone else's. (we probably spend 20-40x as much on each of them compared to most other countries..)

4: ups and downs are inevitable in ANY system.

really, i suggest you study economics at least *some* before you enter discussions about it.

[colm]

We need to get used to having less "stuff", paying more for it and getting things made in our own countries by our own workers. The era of conspicuous consumption fuelled by easy credit is rapidly coming to an end... ask the Greeks.

I agree...and not only agree, but to further add history repeats itself. anyhting that goes extreme loses life dramatically...the larger the extreme, the larger the loss.

An island civilization is entire continents on a much much faster ambivalent scale. The more words in an alphabet, the slower the darned evolution of the nation it came from...the biggest extreme ever is going to come from it. All by their own mistakes out of fear.

Imagine getting diagnosed by a chinese mental doctor? The nut case with a talking head is going to win... its called a soul doc. every survivor of supremacy needs one.

[aristide1]

Fayd, you're inhaling way too much propaganda from Faux News, and perhaps other opportunists/snake oil salespeople.

If anyone shouldn't be paid what they are paid it's the non-union Wall St global parasites.


Why don't you go plug the BP hole with all your great knowledge?

[aristide1]

Here ya go Fayd, more employee decisions, right?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37375532/ns ... d_business

Add 3 more to the count.

Oh look it appears the company can pay a little more after all. Isn't Foxconn just one great big humanitarian?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37398510/ns ... d_business

What ever happened to the good old days when Nike used child labor?

I almost forgot to thank Fayd for his "fair and balanced" viewpoint.

Looks like the legal department has solved the problem.

http://www.dailytech.com/Foxconn+Makes+ ... e18526.htm

Back to work you slackers.

[xan_user]

“Foxconn is not a sweatshop, he adds. “They’ve got restaurants and swimming pools….For a factory, it’s a pretty nice factory.

-Apple's Führer

To minimize the appearance of overcrowding in Theresienstadt, the Nazis deported many Jews to Auschwitz. Also deported in these actions were most of the Czechoslovakian workers assigned to 'Operation Embellishment.' It is claimed that they also erected fake shops and cafés to imply that the Jews lived in relative comfort...

- Theresienstadt