Human Rights And Its Effects On The Chinese Employees

In Vietnamese factories, workers making Nike merchandize have been found to be forced to work over 600 hours of overtime a year, which is more than 400 hours a year above the legal limit in Vietnam (“Fact Sheet”). Workers have reported being coerced into the overtime hours through threats of unemployment or forced indirectly by the low pay to volunteer for the hours in order to support their families. This in other words is a form of slavery. There are only 24 hours in a day and to spend 16 hours or more at work in order to keep a job is a complete denial of a right to life, or in other words a human rights violation.

With the implementation of minimum wage and rising production costs in the United States, many companies have found themselves looking for a way to save money on production. Clothing manufacturers such as Nike have used labor forces in other countries, mainly in Asia to produce their products. These countries can offer similar quality labor for a cheaper cost on wages. The lower or non existent minimum wage laws in foreign countries allow companies like Nike to cut production costs drastically, while still being able to produce quality products. Similar trends are starting to creep into software companies. They are finding a workforce able to do similar work as the American workers, but for less pay.

• The enormous surplus of labor in China imperils workers worldwide as international competition puts incessant downward pressure on wages and working conditions, leading the apparel and textile industries to favor the cheapest and most Draconian producers.

Dexter Roberts and Pete Engardio in “Secrets, Lies, and Sweatshops,” writes about the various struggles that the United States has with production factories overseas. Wal-Mart claims they have rules for the sweatshops to follow but China still violates the labor laws by hiring consultants to give tips to sneak around auditors. The American people enjoy their everyday items at a low price, which Wal-Mart demands to the sweatshops. The sweatshops are struggling to provide these low price items to Wal-Mart and keep their working conditions humane. Roberts and Engardio explain in the article how companies that have overseas production are attempting to provide the managers and employees with skills to make the overtime required more effective.

This kink is named oversea factories with horrible working conditions. A factory in Suquian, China, owned by Apple, was found to have “serious health and safety, environmental, and human rights violations.” Articles rarely tell you the specific violations are, but you can probably add them up for yourself. Health violations can include dangerous machinery, not supplying proper safety gear for the workers, and more. Environmental conditions could be considered black mold, something wrong with the factory ventilation systems, or sewage dumping near the factory. Last, but not least to address in this case, is human rights violations and those can go on forever. A few of them are basic slaves, unequipped, and being made to work exceedingly long and unnecessary hours. This means that the iPhones in your pockets were made by other human beings who were being underpaid or not paid at all, working with dangerous machinery, and unsafe

The People’s Republic of China with a population 1.3 billion, is the third largest country in the world and has a land size of 960,000 square kilometres. It is a rapidly growing economy, with living standards being raised every year. However, human rights violations are still a part of daily life in some part of China and can still be seen in the present time. The most controversial issues include discrimination, right to live and not to be subject to torture, freedom of religion, opinion, to fair public hearing, rights to family and the right of movement. (The Consulate General of The People's Republic of China, 2003),(Infoplease, 2009)

Apple may be that suave popular kid in class, but deep inside, they're a depressing wreck that is being destroyed by the outside forces of society. Meanwhile, that fat, mean, redneck kid Walmart is the one bathing in the rays of success. What kind of sick world is this? It's pretty close to the one we all live in and we have the FBI to thank for it.

Apple is well known for its quality products such as iPhone, iPads and Laptops. Foxconn has been exploiting the labor in china by paying them less wages, and asking them to work in hazardous conditions ranging from health and safety violations to the use of underage workers (Nystedt, 2011). Unfortunately, Foxconn had a grim history of suicides at its factories in 2010, it made 18 workers throw themselves from the tops of the company's buildings, with 14 deaths and faced with strongly criticism from the public. After solving both physically and mentally for the victims' families, parallel with impaling HRM of company, the scandal of Apple was gradually

China is one of our biggest labor competitors. The reason many US companies go to China for outsourcing is again, because of their workforce’s willingness to operate at low costs. Michael Zimmerman describes this as a disparity in worker “tolerance”. Where the low wages found in China are “far lower than U.S.

Imagine only seeing your family for one day once a year. Having to compete for a ticket home with millions of other workers in order to see your family that you haven’t seen in a year. This is the life of 130 million migrant workers in china. These workers make most of the things we own. Most of us don’t think about the people who make our clothes, our phones, our computers; items that we use everyday. Our way of life revolves on mass consumerism, where we value the article more than the person or persons who made it. Mass media and multi million dollar industries keep the conditions on how these people work as a total mystery. Some brands have been exposed for sweatshop and

“Inside the factory, amid clattering machinery and clouds of sawdust, men without earplugs or protective goggles feed wood into screaming electric saws, making cabinets for stereo speakers” (Goodman and Pan 1). In the article Chinese Workers Pay for Wal-Mart’s Low Prices by Peter Goodman and Philip Pan the mistreatment of the migrant workers in China is evident. These kinds of behaviors are taking place all over in China. The abuse of the Chinese work force has reached terrible proportions and created unlawful conditions because of the demanding economy of China, and other countries’ needs of the goods; however, the companies that are centered in China are working to make sure their workers are treated fairly.

Labor relations in China have become more and more complex, labor conflicts have occurred frequently, and thus labor disputes have been growing with a rate much faster than that of the development of GDP in the past decade. They could become a potential obstacle to the economic development if not appropriately managed. The paper studies the condition of labor relations, and probes the profound reasons for it, and compares it across the world in order to give a description for it.

As an evolving technology company, Apple is one of the most successful companies in history. In today’s society, we cannot live without Apple products such as the Pad or IPhone. Apple 's success has come at a high cost with regards to safety to the workers of Foxconn, a supplier which makes products for Apple and plenty of other tech giants. As a result, some workers have committed suicide and many riots and fights have broken out.

It was a decade ago when the Mail on Sunday claimed Apple’s Chinese factory workers were working under sweatshop conditions, and that the iPod factory workers had 60 hour weeks (Heffernan 2013). Apple examined this allegation by making efforts to certify that conditions were passable by company standards (Heffernan 2013).

Apple is being criticized in China for three main issues, including slave labor, guarantee scandal and underdeveloped infrastructure. However, China is a significant market for Apple. Apple’s market share in China is continuously growing while decreasing in mature countries. Issues related to human rights and labor protection in China are sensitive and of globally mutual concern. If we do not address these issues properly, we will lose Chinese customers as well as suppliers and sub-contractors. This may also seriously impact the reputation and sales of Apple products worldwide.