Foxconn Employee Update

J

John_Keck

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 3, 2010
Messages
379
A new report is saying that the 30% raise Foxconn had announced back in June was a sham. Reports are stating the raise was no higher than 9.1% and that workers are missing out on bonuses which were promised to them. What is even more shocking and appalling are the reports of privacy invasion and physical abuse.

A survey, conducted by more than 60 teachers and students from 20 different universities in Hong Kong and Taiwan found that at the company’s Shenzhen, Kunshan, Taiyuan, Wuhan and Shanghai plants, workers were being abused and were the victims of other human rights violations. In some plants, the abused workers made more than 50% of the plants employees
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gotta motivate them somehow!


its pathetic to find this out like this. I am surprised they allowed researchers near the employees.
but what can you do, almost everything you buy is made by foxconn, its not like you can stop buying apple products when your iphone or dell computer is about to die.
 
Wow I am so amazed. I had no idea something like this would happen. Yes this is truly surprising.
 
Cheap Chinese labor should be identified like conflict diamonds.

I want to know when the corners a company cut to make my product affordable were funding a refuse pile like Foxconn.
 
MethylONE said:
Enjoy your iPhones!!!
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Says the pot to the kettle...

You act as tough foxconn is the only Chinese manufacturer out there- at least their employees GOT a raise- sure it wasn't the promised amount, but lets not forget the hundreds of millions of other Chinese laborers who got nothing- and work in conditions worse than those found in the foxconn plants. How about that shirt your wearing? Where was it made? Have you read about the working conditions in the textile industry? It's not uncommon for people to be CHAINED to their sewing machine. Seriously- for anyone saying "OMG!"- if you're going to grow a social conscience, extend it to all products and all people- otherwise using working conditions as a talking point for ragging on a specific geek product you don't like is simply exploiting those same workers all over again.

If you want to genuinely nurture your newfound social conscience, there are options out there, some of which don't cost any extra money on your part- New Balance shoes for example use US labor and when possible source US materials.
 
I now realize why nothing is made in America. Where else can you go and have the freedom to abuse your employees, and under pay them to the point where there annual paycheck is less then a Nintendo Wii.

Does America have that kind of freedom? I think not.
 
marshac said:
Says the pot to the kettle...
New Balance shoes for example use US labor and when possible source US materials.
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Thanks for that !

Back to the topic, when you buy any item that is manufactured by underpaid labour, do you really think that is the savings ? The savings comes from the manager hierarchy, the lack of taxes, the lack of restrictions on pollution, etc. etc. If you consider the actual man hrs. to assemble a personal electronic device, one that sells for 500-900 bucks over here, it is probably less than 30 mins of touch time. So the actual labour saving on an item of that nature versus making it here is probably $10-$15 per item. If anyone remembers approx 20 years ago when Jeep moved production to Mexico, the price of a vehicle here didn't change at all, just how the price of it was divided up changed, but not the price itself. In other words profits for CEO's and shareholders went up, cost stayed the same.
I'm just sick of them using labour as a scapegoat
 
Ashbringer said:
I now realize why nothing is made in America. Where else can you go and have the freedom to abuse your employees, and under pay them to the point where there annual paycheck is less then a Nintendo Wii.

Does America have that kind of freedom? I think not.
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Yea it's all about money, and wanted more money. Greed.

Unforunately if more labor was moved back to the US, prices would go up for the companies trying to compensate for the increase in price. This would lead to inflation, and blah blah blah. America is too dependent on other countries. Were seriously SOL if China or South America places an embargo on us.

No good way around, if America mandated companies increase the amount of workers in America, then I wouldn't doubt that some companies move completely out of the US and relocated in another country then just export their products. If they did that, then we would increase import taxes which would still increase the price.

:(
 
MethylONE said:
Enjoy your iPhones!!!
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Last I checked, a lot of products are made by Foxconn. Apple, Dell, HP, it doesn't matter. Chances are it went through foxconn.

Also, what makes you think Foxconn is the only Chinese manufacturer that does this? I bet you there are far worse then Foxconn. Not saying Foxconn is good, but they're no different.

To anyone who says, "that's how we get cheap products", I really doubt it. The cheaper a company makes a product, the more money they can pocket.

Besides, when was the last time you bought a product from China and said, "This is Quality". Nothing good is made from China. The material they make there products, is weaker then dried up shit. Probably 10x more toxic then dried up shit too. I always get a fear of dread, when I buy a car part and find out it's made in China. It's one thing to buy gizmo's that break within 3 years, like clock work, but it's another when you're putting your life in danger.
 
King Icewind said:
Yea it's all about money, and wanted more money. Greed.

Unforunately if more labor was moved back to the US, prices would go up for the companies trying to compensate for the increase in price. This would lead to inflation, and blah blah blah. America is too dependent on other countries. Were seriously SOL if China or South America places an embargo on us.

No good way around, if America mandated companies increase the amount of workers in America, then I wouldn't doubt that some companies move completely out of the US and relocated in another country then just export their products. If they did that, then we would increase import taxes which would still increase the price.

:(
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I'm not sure how inflation would happen, if we made more products here. We didn't have a problem with products made in America in the past, so how could it be a bad thing now?

Try not to forget that, if we buy everything and make nothing. then it's just a matter of time before we're all broke. Besides the already rich fat cats.

Personally, I think there should be a law that says that 30% of products sold in a country, should be made in that country. It's a reasonable law, as you're not forced to make 100% of it in America. You could have America make the boxes that hold the item, and UK could make the buttons, and France could make the foam.

While I'm sure we're improved China's economy drastically, we shouldn't rely on them entirely for manufacturing.
 
Ashbringer said:
I'm not sure how inflation would happen, if we made more products here. We didn't have a problem with products made in America in the past, so how could it be a bad thing now?

Try not to forget that, if we buy everything and make nothing. then it's just a matter of time before we're all broke. Besides the already rich fat cats.

Personally, I think there should be a law that says that 30% of products sold in a country, should be made in that country. It's a reasonable law, as you're not forced to make 100% of it in America. You could have America make the boxes that hold the item, and UK could make the buttons, and France could make the foam.

While I'm sure we're improved China's economy drastically, we shouldn't rely on them entirely for manufacturing.
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There would be inflation because of the increase of money back into our economy (providing the entire process is in America).
 
eh, what exactly constitutes underpaid labor? Working in a rice field for 18 hours a day to hope you have a good harvest so your family will eat in winter? Thank god my father never abused me to get me to work in the garden as a child - or did he? Articles like this would be more meaningful with a context of what the average standard of living is in that country. Meaningless to quote dollars and hours and compare to what we are used to in the US. Anyway they took our cheap low paying jobs, leaving us with a bunch of 'entitled' unemployed people. No doubt some other country like vietnam will do the same to them.
 
well on the upside.

my plan to create a servant staff from the cute foxconn employees may still be on

awesome. work visa's for the US and better pay...and still a steal for me >_>
 
FragMagnet said:
The savings comes from the manager hierarchy, the lack of taxes, the lack of restrictions on pollution, etc. etc.
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Management by definition is part of the personnel costs, so let's ignore that for a moment. I agree that high taxes, and the ability to externalize costs are key- such costs don't even need to be monetary, but could simply be the ability to dispose of toxic chemicals into a stream. The tax structure is also a killer for US competitiveness- even State to State competitiveness- look at all the high tech companies leaving California for neighboring states like Utah (Adobe is one example). With high income taxes and an environment that's somewhat hostile to business, I have no idea why any company would willfully remain in California. Oregon is following California's lead with their "soak the rich" tax structure passed this past year. Nobody starts a company for the purpose of hiring employees- people start a business in order to 'get rich'- that's the cornerstone of capitalism. Sadly, we're forgetting that fact and it's costing us jobs.

I will say though, that labor costs are most companies largest single line item expense (although if you amortize the cost/widget, it can become insignificant to the price of that good)- when I was preparing budgets for my department, it was always the most expensive item (this included benefits and payroll taxes). Items such as software licenses, servers, and other capital expenses were way way down the list.
 
Foxconn is a crappy brand am I wrong? Who actually buys that semi-reliable junk?
 
Luxor said:
Foxconn is a crappy brand am I wrong? Who actually buys that semi-reliable junk?
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their motherboards are alright.

the thing is they are a HUGE oem manufacturer...take a look at your motherboard, the retention bracket for your cpu is probably foxconn. they also make cell phone boards and a bunch of other stuff.

thats the issue, you couldn't boycott them if you wanted to.
 
King Icewind said:
There would be inflation because of the increase of money back into our economy (providing the entire process is in America).
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More money doesn't equate to more inflation- you also need to consider wealth generation. If you double the money supply, but triple the wealth created (and velocity remains the same), you would actually have deflation.

MV=PT
 
FragMagnet said:
Thanks for that !

Back to the topic, when you buy any item that is manufactured by underpaid labour, do you really think that is the savings ? The savings comes from the manager hierarchy, the lack of taxes, the lack of restrictions on pollution, etc. etc. If you consider the actual man hrs. to assemble a personal electronic device, one that sells for 500-900 bucks over here, it is probably less than 30 mins of touch time. So the actual labour saving on an item of that nature versus making it here is probably $10-$15 per item. If anyone remembers approx 20 years ago when Jeep moved production to Mexico, the price of a vehicle here didn't change at all, just how the price of it was divided up changed, but not the price itself. In other words profits for CEO's and shareholders went up, cost stayed the same.
I'm just sick of them using labour as a scapegoat
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Actually that is a big part of the savings, billions worth in fact. You can put this on taxes and government regulation all you like, if both were removed you still have that glaring wage difference.

Seriously people that read these forums are usually good at maths.
 
Manaknight said:
their motherboards are alright.

the thing is they are a HUGE oem manufacturer...take a look at your motherboard, the retention bracket for your cpu is probably foxconn. they also make cell phone boards and a bunch of other stuff.

thats the issue, you couldn't boycott them if you wanted to.
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yeah, but isnt most of the stuff lately just billions of iphones and ipods? I forgot about the OEM parts though, youre right
 
IRSmurf said:
Cheap Chinese labor should be identified like conflict diamonds.

I want to know when the corners a company cut to make my product affordable were funding a refuse pile like Foxconn.
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Looking at your sig, I see no fewer than half a dozen offending products. Get to throwing that shit out pronto brah.
 
jiminator said:
Anyway they took our cheap low paying jobs, leaving us with a bunch of 'entitled' unemployed people. No doubt some other country like vietnam will do the same to them.
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Yeah! Those Chinese people took those jobs out of spite! They're laughing at us right now because we must give our Hard Earned Tax Dollars to unemployed people! The blame lies with them and not the employers! I shouldn't have to pay for other people's shit! Every man is an island! Dey tuk ar jeurbs! The free market will fix it!
 
NKDietrich said:
Looking at your sig, I see no fewer than half a dozen offending products. Get to throwing that shit out pronto brah.
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>.> That's not really the point. The point is, with a system like that, I could CHOOSE to pay a premium for a company that treats laborers well instead of a cheaper brand that treats laborers like slaves.
 
Sighs, can you guys believe that one of my seniors(who counts as a boss of sorts atm) actually praises China's economy model?

I have to keep my mouth shut for at least 1 year longer but damn... it is pretty enervating.
 
Everything we consume in the developed world is based on blood and sweat in the developing world. I don't understand why this is a surprise to anyone, nor why it's particularly upsetting. In order for me to have there ought to be thousands of have-not's. That's the reality of life and frankly even the most appalled on the forums wouldn't want it any other way IRL. Hardly news.
 
marshac said:
You act as tough foxconn is the only Chinese manufacturer out there- at least their employees GOT a raise....
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Yep. Teachers in my state took a 7-10% PAY CUT this year.

Promising a bonus and not delivering is still pretty low in my opinion, though.
 
Luxor said:
Foxconn is a crappy brand am I wrong? Who actually buys that semi-reliable junk?
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Foxconn actually also makes a lot of the components found on just about every motherboard from every manufacturer. Things such as sockets, connectors, etc. They also do board level assembly for many major companies such as Dell, Apple, HP, and the recent "built by NVIDIA cards" sold at Best Buy.
 
Heh, that 30% was too good to be true from the start.

No surprise really. The reason why many companies are moving their factories to China is because they can get away with underpaying their workers and treat them like shit. Cheap labor that isn't possible elsewhere
 
Hornet said:
Heh, that 30% was too good to be true from the start.

No surprise really. The reason why many companies are moving their factories to China is because they can get away with underpaying their workers and treat them like shit. Cheap labor that isn't possible elsewhere
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They are not being "underpaid", they are paid less due to wage disparity. What they are paid is a fair valuation of their labor in China.
 
Tobit said:
Foxconn actually also makes a lot of the components found on just about every motherboard from every manufacturer. Things such as sockets, connectors, etc. They also do board level assembly for many major companies such as Dell, Apple, HP, and the recent "built by NVIDIA cards" sold at Best Buy.
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Outside of a few companies most of the reference Nvidia cards use Foxconn boards. I believe they did the reference boards for either the Nforce 5 or Nforce 6 boards as well. Beyond that, its not just computers. Foxconn is involved in a lot of consumer electronics devices.
 
I really want to know why any of you care what a Chinese laborer makes? There is so much hypocrisy being flung around I don't know where to begin.
 
Tobit said:
Foxconn actually also makes a lot of the components found on just about every motherboard from every manufacturer. Things such as sockets, connectors, etc. They also do board level assembly for many major companies such as Dell, Apple, HP, and the recent "built by NVIDIA cards" sold at Best Buy.
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Difference between Apple and other manufacturers is that they are commisioned to lower their production cost and make cheaper products for consumers. The end user actually benefits. In the case of iPhones, the production cost is lowered yet the retail price is several times higher, only Apple is benefiting from it, not the consumers.
 
Methadras said:
I really want to know why any of you care what a Chinese laborer makes? There is so much hypocrisy being flung around I don't know where to begin.
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For $1,000.00 a unit that only costs about $200.00 to make, you'd expect the ones who make these phones to be well off, only to find out that they're scrimping on the parts and labor like any other product. So if the money isn't going to the employees and making their lives better, where is the money going?

Heck, if the manufacturing and quality is no different from any other company and using the same factories and workers as any other, are you really getting your moneys worth?
 
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