“‘It’s a difficult situation,’ Jobs said at the All Things Digital conference in California on Tuesday. ‘We’re trying to understand right now, before we go in and say we know the solution,'” Chang, Tung, Soh and Hung report.
“Taiwan contract electronics maker Hon Hai Precision Industry, the owner of Foxconn, said on Wednesday that the cash component of wages would rise by 30 percent effective immediately, more than the 20 percent rise the company had talked about late last month,” Chang, Tung, Soh and Hung report.
Full article here.
What’s that? An extra 30 cents a day? 😐
Whatever it is, it’s a very impressive size to suddenly happen. Good for Foxconn and Apple PR too.
I remember being told once that it was better to remain silent, and let others think you a fool, than to open your mouth and leave no doubt.
Chinese workers (on average) do not make our minimum wage, but neither do they have our cost of living. That said, the move from communism to capitalism has increased living standards in China dramatically.
Pay raises, like the one just announced, are a sign that China’s economy is growing and labor has far more employment options today than they ever did under Mao.
I am rarely negatively disturbed by anything SJ says, but his comment about the percentage of suicides being below national average and the plant having a swimming pool, thus making it a nice facility, was way out of line. No suicide is good and he should have stated that from the get-go. No swimming pool can make up for bad working conditions or poor pay. SJ needs to get back to his roots.
Come on now! This is just an overtime payment that they were supposed to get all along but now it is made firm.
Read between the lines. iPad production and new iPhone production is ramped way up and Foxconn is finally paying OT.
And we’re moving towards socialism in the U.S. and our quality of life is going way down. Hope and Change TM!
@ Greg Thurman,
When did China move from communism to capitalism? I must have missed that.
I think they need more of a life than money. More meaningful relationships with human beings. What are they going to do with the extra money other than send it home? They’re still living in extremely cramped quarters on that campus site right by the factory.
The problem is their lack of outlets to derive pleasure. It makes for such a miserable existence. Just check out one of Gizmodo’s stories on the topic:
http://gizmodo.com/5542527/undercover-report-from-foxconns-hell-factory
“There are other kind of dreams too. Liu says that some of them complain about their love lives. They just can’t find lovers in that environment, so they have to find alternatives: In some internet cafes—hiding in restaurants outside the factory—young men can buy access to clandestine porn videos. However, the men say that the movies get boring after long periods of time.”
Is it any wonder they’re being driven to madness? What kind of life is that to live, where you have no friends and no partners and your sole source of sexual relief is a good wank every now and again to some porn? It’s sickening, and I don’t think I’d last very long under such depressing conditions. I’d be looking for the nearest Foxconn rooftop myself within six months of that shit.
How much sun are they getting? You can bet it’s very little. What about their daily vitamin intake? Are they treated for depression? It’s a travesty, and a raise in their paychecks won’t make one bit of difference.
@ Gregg Thurman
That is one of my favorite quotes by Abraham Lincoln. It is actually, “It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.”
But I got you…
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@ R2
It is “The Island”…they have lottery winnings to go to “The Island”…They all wear white Puma track suits and shoes. They just discovered the word, “Dude”.
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@Amazin1
I saw a similar post yesterday, and it deserves much the same response. Yes, SJ could have stated his regret regarding the suicides at Foxconn. But he is the CEO of Apple and he stated the facts. There are suicides all over the world, and plenty in the U.S. The Foxconn workforce at that one facility is equivalent to a modest city in the U.S., and the U.S. also has a problem with suicides.
You can be disappointed with SJ if you want. But what are you doing about the suicide problem besides complaining that SJ did not respond the “right” way?
The thing that bothers me about this highly publicized situation is that the result might encourage others to use suicide as a way of pushing for social change.
“The thing that bothers me about this highly publicized situation is that the result might encourage others to use suicide as a way of pushing for social change.”
Bobby Sands tried that in Northern Ireland years ago.
@ Amazin1,
The suicide rate at the Foxconn campus is a surprisingly low 2 per 100,000 per year.
The suicide rate at American colleges and universities ranges from 5 per 100,000 per year at party schools to 10 per 100,000 per year at serious institutes of higher learning like MIT.
When Steve Jobs said the suicide rate was low at Foxconn he damn well meant it was low.
Both places have kids, about the same age, a long way from home, for the first time in their lives, in a strange place, far away from friends and family. Depression happens.
If you measure quality of life by the suicide rate, the kids working at the Foxconn campus have 2.5 to 5 times better quality of life than kids at American college campuses.
Let’s get real here. If Apple can’t be bashed over it’s environmental record, let’s hit them with slave labor charges. The whole thing is bullshit.
“Foxconn is finally paying OT.”
From what I read, Foxconn has always paid OT… in fact, the conventional wisdom in China is that you do NOT work a job unless it pays overtime. The understanding is that 40 hours a week just won’t cut it. Foxconn finds employees, even though they pay lower than the Chinese minimum wage, based solely on the OT (many companies can’t offer OT).
Isn’t the “victim” of a suicide also the perpetrator? Working conditions are not the cause of any suicide. Someone deciding to end their own life is the cause. I can’t understand why people keep trying to treat this like it’s some kind of “safety” issue the company is responsible for. I’m very glad for those about to benefit from such a huge bump in pay, but I think it’s a bad idea as a direct response to suicide. Is this not extortion? Granted, it’s perverted in that the extortionists receive no money. But acquiescing to, “Pay us more or I kill myself” doesn’t help anybody. I’m not saying any suicidist ever made that specific request, but Hon Hai, a few reporters and Apple seem to be acting like some have.
“There are suicides all over the world, and plenty in the U.S.”
I think he stated it very well. Unlike many who seem to believe that Chinese lives are worth saving, but American lives… well, they must be committing suicide because they’re lazy.
Apple is the only company that would do this for non-employees.
I believe this little “raise” has nothing to do with suicide and everything to do with “leaks”.
Back in HP, the management can’t wait for more “self-firing” from their employees to help save the company money.
Some of you frame this vainly as a matter of “working conditions” like these people work and go home the way we’re fortunate enough to do.
They live on a Foxconn campus. They go from the work site to the dormitories and back to the factory for some more the next day.
Foxconn OWNS them. They’re cattle. It’s not just work, Foxconn controls their lives outside of the factory as well.
http://www.cultofmac.com/inside-foxconn-factory-town-or-heavily-secure-college-campus/45199
CNN paid a visit to Foxconn, the Chinese factory complex where 10 workers jumped to their deaths this year.
What did they find? A super-concentrated complex in Shenzen where sleeping quarters, restaurants, hospitals, supermarkets and swimming pools are packed into 2.3 square kilometers (about 0.9 square miles).
It’s a factory town, they report, that feels more like a “heavily secure” university campus.
“They wake up, they have breakfast, they go to work, they work solid shift, they come back to their dormitories and they sleep … it’s a very dehumanizing place, and the workers are little more than machines there,” said Geoffrey Crothall of the China Labor Bulletin, a non-profit group that tries to protect workers’ rights across China.
So it’s a factory town that is full of young people so maybe a little more like a huge college campus. So perhaps there is some fun going too. They employ both sexes so just maybe they actually run into each other. IF those young people view this as a step rather than an end, I would have been happy to have had that chance myself.
“It’s a factory town, they report, that feels more like a “heavily secure” university campus.”
Ooooooh, it’s heavily secure… almost like they have things there that they don’t want people to know about… like maybe unreleased products????
Yes, China’s economy is growing and there are substantial difference in cost of living, but in 2004 an average worker made US$0.64 per hour according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The 2006 numbers (released in 2009) put the manufacturing jobs at an average compensation of US$0.81 per hour. Given that China’s growth has slowed down (but still much better than the United States’), I would suspect that the average compensation is in the $1.00 an hour range, hence, my snarky 30 cents comment.
With that being said, as a former Foxconn investor from ’04-’07, Foxconn’s profits were up almost 300% and their revenues were up over 210% so, percentage-wise the wage increase looks good, but compared to how much money the company makes, it’s not much. It’s like the wage disparity in the United States between CEO and worker, but, the middle class here get to enjoy much more luxury compared to their Chinese counterpart which is why you don’t see too much grumbling or public protest or labor strikes.
My point is, things are better, but not as dramatically as one is led to believe. The 30% press release, while nice on paper, really is just a way of hyperbolizing the pennies per hour increase the workers will get.
@ Amazin1
The Foxconn Company IS below the China national average. I’ve been reading that from a number of sources for days now. (although conveniently forgotten by those who wish to criticize Apple) Nothing wrong with Steve correcting other’s about that perception.
The shocking part is China’s national average for suicide, not so much Foxconn’s working conditions.
It’s always good though to be looking at a company the size of Foxconn as well.
I do wonder what the United States’ national average is (not just college and universities) compared to China.