Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is there anything about sitting in a line manufacturing electronics that requires 12 hours shifts?
Profit
And it isn't for the peons doing all the work...
Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
131–140 of 267 posts
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#132Vote with your dollars, people. Don't buy Apple and Foxconn products if you care about the wellbeing of workers.
Wait what? Because of 12 hour shifts? Should I not use hospitals either? Or are you referring to other working conditions unrelated to 12 hour shifts?
Is someone doing the same task 60 times a minute in the hospital that entire shift minus a lunch break? Do assembly line workers for Apple get treated the same as hospital workers? Not eve close! Do hospital workers have to ask permission to go to the bathroom? Do hospitals have suicide nets to prevent their workers from trying to kill themselves because they have lost all hope? You are talking two very different things.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#133I try not to judge these jobs by first world standards.
What I don't understand is why a company can use $2 an hour labor and then sell a product for $1K.
If I ran the US, I would put heavy tariffs on goods that companies try to outsource for cheap labor.
This would encourage them to use technology and robotics to produce domestically.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
The most obvious problem is that you make workers compete against each other in a race to the bottom, with fewer and fewer protections, and employers select among the workers for those most willing to endure the most demanding hardship.
So because some people don't want to work more than 8 hours a day we must prevent everybody from working more than 8 hours a day because it will inevitably spiral into a race to the bottom? That's rhetorically pretty loose. Do we have that problem in the US? No. I don't believe this race to the bottom actually exists. Companies need all sorts of labor. Diversity of labor is good.
>No. I don't believe this race to the bottom actually exists.
There are literally companies using child labor in the US RIGHT NOW, and a huge argument against increasing minimum wage is that "they are jobs for teens and teens don't need that much money" so desperate (or privileged enough in their position to not need to demand more) people are depressing wages in the US currently.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
I like when people use words like inexplicable for things for which they know exactly how it’s achieved, but want to pretend they don’t because the answer is disturbing.
iPhones are not worth that answer. Nor is any other electronic. I wish this was escapable somehow, but my employer literally requires and pays for this equipment. To abstain from employment would be crazy – it wouldn't send a message to Apple. What the hell can someone do?
I think a general strike is desperately needed. Seeing Biden do a complete about face on unions to enrich the robber barons that run domestic rail was the last sign I needed. Unfortunately the people who would benefit the most from striking are those who either drink the propaganda from conservative outlets or are otherwise marginalized. Felons, people on probation, green card workers, the poorly educated, chronically overworked, etc.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
Although it's not great to need to work that much, you can make absolute bank doing overtime. My mom's a nurse and occasionally gets called in out of the blue if there's shortages. If she agrees, she can get x2 to sometimes even x3 depending on what time and day of the year it is. As much of a drag it can be getting woken up to work, she still gets excited when it happens because of how good the pay is.
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Yes, I have a feeling the only people making decent money are those who are difficult to replace. Everyone else, well, they will readily be swapped out. They have no agency or power.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m no expert on this but there’s a long history in the fight for an 8 hour work day. Many people (myself included) think we should move to even shorter workdays, or shorter work weeks. I like the slogan they had: “8 hours for sleep, 8 hours for work, 8 hours for what we will” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-hour_day
Nobody is forcing anybody to work 12 hours a day?
Dcow says this in a discussion about a company that has to put suicide nets in their factories to prevent their workers from killing themselves.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
This reminds me of when people in China were expected to work on Saturdays back in 1999. Developing countries often require 48 hours a week as a way of catching up.
1999? This was news in 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system
Jack Ma took some bad rap for promoting it if I remember correctly
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
I like when people use words like inexplicable for things for which they know exactly how it’s achieved, but want to pretend they don’t because the answer is disturbing.
iPhones are not worth that answer. Nor is any other electronic. I wish this was escapable somehow, but my employer literally requires and pays for this equipment. To abstain from employment would be crazy – it wouldn't send a message to Apple. What the hell can someone do?
Corporate legal requirement to maximize shareholder value makes their behavior gas like, they’ll expand to fill all possible space and permeate any advantageous cracks. It’s counter productive and contrary to reality to pick on any one company for behaving as they’re legally obligated to do. The issue isn’t apple, the issue is governments that allow behavior we can’t accept by corporations. The way to prevent a gas from permeating spaces you don’t want it in is to seal the space, not rage against hydrogen.
Re: Apple and Foxconn win permission for 12-hour shifts for women in India
#140I try not to judge these jobs by first world standards. What I don't understand is why a company can use $2 an hour labor and then sell a product for $1K. If I ran the US, I would put heavy tariffs on goods that companies try to outsource for cheap labor. This would encourage them to use technology and robotics to produce domestically.
Tariffs would increase the cost of these outrageously profitable products decreasing their market reducing sales. All things capitalists hate. Lofty goals like safe working conditions will always be fought against by capitalists who, by design of their own, are completely disconnected from the reality their greed creates.