51–60 of 73 posts
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Why do you think the kids work there? Is it voluntary or involuntary? Suppose it's voluntary. If so, then if you stop them from having that job, they will believe you've hurt them, by taking away their preferred life option. Correct?
The same arguments were made when we decided that children shouldn't mine coal. The argument is wrong.
At least they don't let iPhone apps show boobs. They wouldn't want to "sully" their image.
I don't know why you are getting down voted. It's says much about society that you are. People on this site get outraged about App Store policies but not about child labor and Apple's ability to wash it's hands because the labor was contracted through a third party and they periodically do audits. God forbid Apple actually own the factory that makes their products and ensures that no children ever work there.
This story is the moral equivalent of turning "Apple fires employee for kicking co-worker in crotch" to "Apple caught kicking employees in crotch".
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Is this a serious request? You want me to cite the basis for me stating that our society became better by outlawing the employment of children in factories and mines? This isn't obvious to you? I am grateful that people with your point of view didn't prevail when the United States confronted this issue.
The US and the rest of the west experienced unprecedented per capita BNP growth since around the time western countries banned child labour. This is the reason for increased living standards. It would not have mattered much in the long run who prevailed because rich (by the standards of 1850 we pretty much all are) parents don't let their children work full time in factories.
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I don't know why you are getting down voted. It's says much about society that you are. People on this site get outraged about App Store policies but not about child labor and Apple's ability to wash it's hands because the labor was contracted through a third party and they periodically do audits. God forbid Apple actually own the factory that makes their products and ensures that no children ever work there.
Apple may not own the factories (why the fuck would they, they're not a manufacturing company) but they do what they can to ensure children don't work in the factories that build their products. They've stopped doing business with the contractors that were using child labor. This story is the moral equivalent of turning "Apple fires employee for kicking co-worker in crotch" to "Apple caught kicking employees in crotc…
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I'm from the Canal Zone. I grew up there. I'm a former American colonist. The bulk of the workforce was Panamanian. Their wages were much lower than American wages. The justification by we Americans was that they were paid better by the Company than they would get in Panama. It's the standard imperial justification and it's wrong. Panama has done quite well without America and their wages have improved. This isn't un…
Who said anything about forced labor? If the choice is between paying someone in another country the same amount you'd pay someone at home and not hiring them at all, the simple fact is, they're not going to be hired at all. The unspoken assumption, of course, is that we can let the whole rest of the world languish in poverty so long as we're sure that every appliance in our electrified houses and every damned faucet…
Corporations aren't building factories in China so that China benefits. They are building the factories so that they benefit. There are lots of reports of forced labor in China, of unsafe working conditions, and of worker exploitation. Our companies are fine with this arrangement because they fall back on the, "But we don't actually hire these workers. We contract this out." It's wrong.
The American public is OK with the arrangement because it means we can buy cheap crap. We don't mind migrant laborers in this country being exploited because we want cheap food.
What we lose sight of is the damage that this does to us and the world. That pollution that the factories produce in China to make cheap shit for us, in the long run, will do a lot of harm to China and the world. It's immoral for us to benefit from this.
What we could do is make trade contingent on a base level of standards being met. Make companies run the factories instead of hiding behind, "We don't actually hire the workers." The externalities need to be addressed.
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Is this a serious request? You want me to cite the basis for me stating that our society became better by outlawing the employment of children in factories and mines? This isn't obvious to you? I am grateful that people with your point of view didn't prevail when the United States confronted this issue.
The US and the rest of the west experienced unprecedented per capita BNP growth since around the time western countries banned child labour. This is the reason for increased living standards. It would not have mattered much in the long run who prevailed because rich (by the standards of 1850 we pretty much all are) parents don't let their children work full time in factories.
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Similar things were said in the U.S. when we outlawed most forms of factory work for children. Our society became better when we did outlaw this. How about this form of outsourcing? Rather than Apple owning and managing the factory in question they contract it out so they can assuage their guilt when children end up working there.
The US passed laws against child labor when it did because it could afford to, ultimately. You don't find too many poor societies which spontaneously decide to build schools for everyone below the age of 18 and prohibit them from working. You might find a few where some foreign imperialists decided to build schools and send all of the country's youths to it, but I assume you're against that sort of thing. Notably, th…
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I don't know why you are getting down voted. It's says much about society that you are. People on this site get outraged about App Store policies but not about child labor and Apple's ability to wash it's hands because the labor was contracted through a third party and they periodically do audits. God forbid Apple actually own the factory that makes their products and ensures that no children ever work there.
Apple may not own the factories (why the fuck would they, they're not a manufacturing company) but they do what they can to ensure children don't work in the factories that build their products. They've stopped doing business with the contractors that were using child labor. This story is the moral equivalent of turning "Apple fires employee for kicking co-worker in crotch" to "Apple caught kicking employees in crotc…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Who said anything about forced labor? If the choice is between paying someone in another country the same amount you'd pay someone at home and not hiring them at all, the simple fact is, they're not going to be hired at all. The unspoken assumption, of course, is that we can let the whole rest of the world languish in poverty so long as we're sure that every appliance in our electrified houses and every damned faucet…
No one said anything about forced labor. I included it in a list of things that it is immoral to benefit from. In that list of things was child labor; the point of the discussion. Sorry for not making this clearer. I should have left it out. Corporations aren't building factories in China so that China benefits. They are building the factories so that they benefit. There are lots of reports of forced labor in China,…
That's exactly what Apple does, and that's exactly why you're reading this story about Apple, instead of Asus or Lenovo or any other company--because Apple, unlike almost every other company, does the audits and enforces the standards on their contractors.
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Apple may not own the factories (why the fuck would they, they're not a manufacturing company) but they do what they can to ensure children don't work in the factories that build their products. They've stopped doing business with the contractors that were using child labor. This story is the moral equivalent of turning "Apple fires employee for kicking co-worker in crotch" to "Apple caught kicking employees in crotc…
No, it isn't the same moral equivalence. WalMart contracts out its night time cleaning. They didn't do this in the early days but they do it now. Of course one of the companies ended up hiring illegal workers and treating them badly and naturally WalMart claimed innocence. They didn't hire the workers. The company that did this lost its contract with WalMart. It's the don't ask, don't tell policy that corporations lo…