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Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

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Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#21

Post by kokey »

alexlawford wrote: post #19
corin_ wrote: post #5

> The work is clearly very stressful and the pay is terrible. The example the journalist gave was two hours of overtime earning him just $4. Can anyone give any context of how bad this actually is? Obviously it's not as terrible as if somebody got paid $4 for two hours of overtime here in the UK, in terms of average wage and typical cost of living, but no idea how much less bad it is..

It's not too bad. That works out at about 12.5 RMB / hour, more than someone would make working a night shift at KFC here in Guizhou (I expect in Shen Zhen it would be a little higher). I work at a coffee shop owned by my friend here; 6 - 10 RMB / hour is quite typical for unskilled labour. Also, chances are that these factory workers have free accomodation and subsidised food which makes a significant difference. Th…

How many people do you think are migrant workers? People who come from an area where that pay is a lot more than they get back home, work for a certain period of time before resigning. Then they either go back home or find a better paying job in the new area.

Having been a migrant worker myself, I think this is a great way for the mobility of young people, especially when the jobs offer accommodation too.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#22

Post by taligent »

tluyben2 wrote: post #17
drharris wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simple; it's cheaper in the near-term. Keep production flowing while you figure out the automation side.

But for this PARTICULAR example, is it cheaper? I know a bit about robot hacking, not industrial mind you, but this would be a rather trivial machine which could probably replace that entire production line? You might know more than me about it though :)

That's a 'trivial machine' that you have to design, implement, test and most importantly maintain.

Humans don't have those sort of problems.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#23

Post by taligent »

amalag wrote: post #15

So are Chinese upset at Apple, Foxconn, their government, their situation, or their communist totalitarian system?

None of the above. They want work. And this is work that is much better than flipping burgers at McDonalds.

Remember that some of these people might end up designing and producing the products of the future as well. I know if I was 18 I would jump at the chance to take a job like this.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#24

Post by Tyrannosaurs »

Anyone who has significant issues with this needs to stop buying anything marked made in China.

There are some interesting bits in there from the perspective of understanding the manufacturing process, but in terms of the worker conditions and so on, it's nothing new and anyone for whom this is news has presumably been hiding under a rock for the last couple of years and making a concious effort not to think about how certain countries can make things this cheaply.

That's not to make light of the conditions, just to say that we're all somewhat complicit and any outrage needs to be matched with action, not just against Apple but against anyone using Foxconn or their peers.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#25

Post by jjguy »

corin_ wrote: post #5

> The work is clearly very stressful and the pay is terrible. The example the journalist gave was two hours of overtime earning him just $4. Can anyone give any context of how bad this actually is? Obviously it's not as terrible as if somebody got paid $4 for two hours of overtime here in the UK, in terms of average wage and typical cost of living, but no idea how much less bad it is..

What you're referring to is called cultural relativism [1], and is willfully ignored in most media reports of working conditions in foreign countries.

By not providing any context to the local norms, we tend to compare conditions to our norms and see it in stark terms, while the reality is more nuanced. FoxConn's compensation and work conditions may be imperfect, but are good enough relative to local alternatives they have sufficient supply of willing workers. The "exploitation by US consumers" is an effect of globalization.

Most criticism and remediation efforts should not be directed at the various firms, but at the country that allows it to occur.

1- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_relativism

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#26

Post by eckyptang »

terhechte wrote: post #2

After the mess that was the last Apple Foxconn story, and with all the economic pressure that affects newspapers & news media, it becomes increasingly difficult for me to believe stories like these. It's not that I don't suppose that there're bad working conditions at Foxconn - there probably are. No, it's that even if the journalist in this story managed to sneak in, and work there, he probably added tons of hyperbo…

It's probably true and there's nothing Apple or anyone can do about it apart from stop selling things.

I dealt with several Chinese manufacturers in the late 1990's who were doing custom PCB runs for one of our products. They treated their staff like shit then and hid it all under the rug when you went to see them. They wheeled out the turd polish in double-quick time.

I don't think it's changed and I don't think it will change unless people on the production lines just say "no". This has happened in the textile industry over there (according to my cousin who is an importer of textiles) and staff are earning great rates now. The cheaper staff are in Mexico and India now.

Regarding the money - the cost of living is pretty damn cheap over there by their standards.

Note: I don't like buying products myself which are responsible for this sort of thing, but I'm not that sympathetic.

As for the journalists - they are as full of crap as the factory bosses are.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#27

Post by drharris »

tluyben2 wrote: post #17
drharris wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simple; it's cheaper in the near-term. Keep production flowing while you figure out the automation side.

But for this PARTICULAR example, is it cheaper? I know a bit about robot hacking, not industrial mind you, but this would be a rather trivial machine which could probably replace that entire production line? You might know more than me about it though :)

I know a bit on automation, work R&D in a factory. There's no doubt that it's cheaper in the long run, even with costs related to programming, testing, maintenance, and tweaking. But rushing untested robotics into production will almost certainly increase the costs above manual labor. It's better to maintain the current line while you test out the automation, gradually train workers to monitor systems, and switch over one line at a time. This particular story (painting dots) seems like a great case for automation, so I'd suspect they're working on it.

Also keep in mind that sometimes, manual labor trumps robotics. Let's say there will be 70 million of these backplates shipped, and then no more will be needed. That's a lot of automation investment in a solution for a temporary product. Workers can move from one task to the next with ease, while robotics require a lot of development, logistics, and testing. For a company like Foxconn that will always be manufacturing different things, the investment in human labor might allow for more "pivoting" than robotics. Comes down to what makes the most business sense for them.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#28

Post by damian2000 »

smoyer wrote: post #14

What's amazing to me is that they can actually manually make a device that, at least on the outside has almost perfect fit-and-finish. You'd think the inaccuracies would accumulate and produce the typical cheap knock-off look.

I don't think they make the backplate manually ... they're just putting some sort of pen mark on it ... probably in preparation for some other process down the line.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#29

Post by drharris »

taligent wrote: post #22
tluyben2 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But for this PARTICULAR example, is it cheaper? I know a bit about robot hacking, not industrial mind you, but this would be a rather trivial machine which could probably replace that entire production line? You might know more than me about it though :)

That's a 'trivial machine' that you have to design, implement, test and most importantly maintain. Humans don't have those sort of problems.

Training, QA, lunch breaks, maximum daily working hours, overtime, etc. There are benefits and losses on both sides.

Re: Journalist goes undercover making the iPhone 5 at Foxconn

#30

Post by recoiledsnake »

Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #24

Anyone who has significant issues with this needs to stop buying anything marked made in China. There are some interesting bits in there from the perspective of understanding the manufacturing process, but in terms of the worker conditions and so on, it's nothing new and anyone for whom this is news has presumably been hiding under a rock for the last couple of years and making a concious effort not to think about ho…

>That's not to make light of the conditions, just to say that we're all somewhat complicit and any outrage needs to be matched with action, not just against Apple but against anyone using Foxconn or their peers.

I presume Apple has the largest clout with Foxconn and can essentially demand better worker conditions from them. Other companies may not have as much leverage, though I agree there needs to be more awareness about things like laptops, XBox, and PS3.

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