Ever Wonder How China makes Stuff Cheaper than us?
The Construction Site Hard Hat
The Dust and Particle Free Breathing Apparatus
OSHA Approved Scaffolding
And my all-time favorite..
The New Lightweight Welders Mask
The Dust and Particle Free Breathing Apparatus
OSHA Approved Scaffolding
And my all-time favorite..
The New Lightweight Welders Mask
0
-
Quality. 0 -
Zebra, that's probably EXACTLY the reason. 0 -
I've seen a picture of a 4 story scaffolding made of bamboo. Along with no OSHA, they have no Workman's Compensation Program. Workers have to look out for themselves. There is no "safety net". EMployees know they have to look out for themselves because no one else is.
I've also heard claims that Asia's accident rate is much lower than Americas, but I don't understand how they can get accurate statistics out of there.0 -
There is one problem, it's not China! It's India.
Dean0 -
quote: There is one problem, it's not China! It's India
Except for the last picture, I think you're right!0 -
where's pics of the 12 year old factory workers[?] 0 -
They must have steel "toes" in the first and second pics because I don't recognize the boots[:0][8D] 0 -
quote:Originally posted by Captplaid
I've also heard claims that Asia's accident rate is much lower than Americas
Where did you hear that? THOUSANDS of miners die on the job each year in China. When a mine disaster happens here and a few miners die, it's big news. Over there, it's business as usual.0 -
Hey...
It works... [:)]
Where's the problem ?!?0 -
quote:Originally posted by mrseatle
where's pics of the 12 year old factory workers[?]
A third of them are out in the cotton field picking cotton for those 10 pair for $2.98 Walmart Fruit Of The Looms that you enjoy wearing so much.
Dont worry. A Third of them are still sowing.
I hope that you enjoyed decorating the tree with those Guanzhou Huanya factory made for Walmart ornaments.
"As soon as Wal-Mart learned about the Christmas tree ornament report, we contacted the National Labor Committee, and they have not returned our call...."
Not to worry... At least baby can sleep in peace tonight...
"... Meanwhile, the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) released its own report claiming that Wal-Mart is selling wood products made from illegally logged timber, threatening the habitat of the highly endangered Siberian tiger. EIA claimed Chinese manufacturers made 200,000 baby cribs for Wal-Mart (subsequently recalled for baby deaths) from high-risk Russian wood..."
Well maybe not..0 -
quote:Originally posted by Captplaid
I've also heard claims that Asia's accident rate is much lower than Americas, but I don't understand how they can get accurate statistics out of there.
I don't believe that for a second. Work accident rates in Asia are actually quite high, ridiculously so by American standards.
http://www.asia-pacific-action.org/southeastasia/indonesia/indoleft/2006/detik_1336dieinworkrelatedaccidents_120106.htm
Here's a report citing 90,000 work related FATALITIES in China in 2001 (and increasing).
quote:http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2005/pr18/en/
Broken down by region, the figures indicate that workplace accidents have levelled off in many industrialized and newly-industrialized countries, while some countries now undergoing rapid development in Asia and Latin America are experiencing increases. For example, the ILO analysis showed that while the number of fatal and non-fatal workplace accidents held steady or declined in most regions, in China the estimated number of fatal accidents rose from 73,500 in 1998 to 90,500 in 2001,2 while accidents causing three or more days absence from work increased from 56 million to 69 million. Meanwhile, in Latin America, a rise in the total number of persons employed and growth in the construction sector, particularly in Brazil and Mexico, appear to have lead to an annual increase in fatal accidents from 29,500 to 39,500 over the same time period.
In comparison, the number of American work-related fatalities is under 6000 per year. Its no comparison, even factoring in the fact that China's population is four times as large.
Here, you slip on a wet patch in the bathroom and twist your ankle and its a workers comp lawsuit.
In the third world, its fall down and hit your head, and its "get up or you're fired".0 -
they also dont have crooked out of date unions demanding $65 an hour for lazy workers you cant fire because they are union 0 -
No.
Not since I was about twelve and learned about slave labor.0 -
Where the ships go to die
Vast hulks of ocean-going ships loom
over the breaking yards of Alang
Just over a decade ago, no one knew where Alang was. But now this remote spot, on the coast of Gujarat, is firmly on the map. For on this once deserted stretch of beach is the world's largest scrapyard, a thriving centre for one of India's most lucrative businesses : shipbreaking.
Where there's rust, there's brass
At the end of their lives, half the world's ocean-going ships come to Alang to die. The tankers, the liners and the ferries, which carried our the world's freight are dismantled, bolt by bolt, and sold on for scrap. The ships I saw in the breaking yards were the size of blocks of flats, some ten floors high. About three hundred of them are scrapped here each year, about three million tonnes of India's steel.
Everything on the ships can be recycled - the brass screws, the portholes, even the cow dung from the cattle carriers. Both sides of the approach road into Alang are lined with an amazing range of recovered scrap: doors, mirrors, chairs, panelling ... One can buy anything from an unused lifeboat to a bottle of shampoo left behind on one German ship.
Even the smallest metal items
are sorted and recycled
It's reckoned that one in five people in the region is dependent on Alang. The yards have boosted the economy of Gujarat and of India, and the phoenix-like industry has given rise to a group of businessmen called the shipbreakers. One man I met, Subodh Kumar, was in the process of purchasing a Finnish bulk carrier. He was paying ?6.6 million for it but would be able to make double or even quadruple that after it was broken up for scrap and sold on.
Alang is perfect for shipbreaking because the high tides carry the vessels up the beach and wedge them into the sand. There's no need for dry docks or jetties.
The industry has low running costs - it uses almost no electricity or machines - and labour is cheap. About thirty to forty thousand workers - no one is exactly sure of the numbers because no records are kept - work on one of the two hundred or so breaking yards along the beach.
Economic gains, human costs
The labourers are migrants who have come to Gujarat from the poorest states in India - from Bihar, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh - lured here by stories of a new gold rush. Shockingly, they dismantle the ships by hand, with hammers and chisels and blowtorches. The men work under a scorching sun amid acrid fumes of burning steel and paint. It is one of the most dangerous industries in the world.
Alang's migrant workers take
huge risks for low pay
These dangers were what I'd come to Alang to investigate. Shipbreaking is an industrial success for India, supplying jobs to thousands and making millions of pounds. But it's also an environmental and human scandal. Alang is today under attack from critics who accuse the industry of harming the environment and exploiting the workers.
Men at home in Alang:
"we live like dogs"
At the end of their day's shift, I visited the workers in their homes. They live in appalling conditions, huddled together in miles of windowless slums made from discarded ships' timbers. There is no running water, no electricity; there are no toilets or showers. "We live like dogs", they told me. They described terrible accidents at the sites and little protection: men killed by falling steel plates or burned when oil residues combusted. Two days after my arrival, three men died after being hit by a falling crane.
The numbers of deaths and injuries varied according to whether I spoke to the workers or the shipbreakers. But there ARE deaths and injuries, and this was confirmed when I visited Alang's new Red Cross hospital.
It's a tiny place to cater for so many people; the serious medical cases still have to be transported to the nearest city, Bhavnagar. But it has the facilities to patch up about one hundred workers a day and there I saw some bad cases of burns and injured limbs. One of the doctors there, Dr. Jani, told me of Alang's terrible levels of malaria, cholera and leprosy. He worries that cancers might appear soon as a result of the pollution on the sites.
A toxic cargo
This spring Greenpeace delivered the first major study on pollution in Alang. It found dangerously high levels of pollutants which, as the ships are broken up, enter the air, the ground and the sea. It said that every single ship arriving here is a potential death trap.
Nityanand Jayaram: "every ship
is a potential deathtrap"
Nityanand Jayaram, Greenpeace's toxic wastes expert, had managed to gain access to the shipyards to publish the study. He accuses the West of creating yet another case of "third world dumping", and dismisses the efforts of Mr. Kumar and his colleagues to help the workers as "cosmetic". The import of most of these contaminants are banned under international - and Indian - law; yet the laws are routinely ignored.
Jayaram argues that international standards on pollution and workers' rights have to be recognised everywhere - no matter how rich or poor individual countries might be. And although the shipbreaking industry's economic clout makes many reluctant to criticise it publicly, a handful of people - environmentalists, union leaders and lawyers - are now trying to improve conditions.
I visited the home of Pradeep Thakkar, a lawyer who has been fighting the system ever since Alang opened. He takes on compensation cases for workers injured or killed in shipbreaking. In all these years he can remember maybe only 20 cases being solved, and each took years to work its way through the system. There is currently a backlog of at least 300 cases in the labour courts.
Subodh Kumar, proud to be a shipbreaker;
his home is entirely furnished with recovered scrap
"The shipbreakers are trying to avoid paying compensation for major injuries," he told me. Things will only change if the government starts to enforce the laws. It has totally failed to act and corrupt officials have made the situation even worse".
Squaring the circle
Shipbreakers and the local government have recently been forced to act by other forces. The Gujarat High Court has ruled that the authorities must provide decent facilities and accommodation for the workers. One Sunday in Alang I attended the biggest jamboree the place had ever seen, attended by local politicians, the shipbreakers and more than 10,000 workers. All had come to witness the laying of the foundation stone by the Chief Minister for a new model town for Alang, with running water, temples, shops and parks for 15,000 men and their families.
The state plans to eliminate squalid,
overcrowded housing like this
Behind the festivities, there are doubts about how far the changes will go. Whether these promises are kept depends on how much money the government and shipbreakers are prepared to invest.
According to Mr. Kumar, expansion has happened too fast and competition from other shipbreaking countries like Pakistan and Bangladesh is now biting. "We are already doing something for the workers, " Mr. Kumar told me, "providing hard hats and cutting their hours. Extra costs are the last thing we need if the industry is to survive."
The yards are full of toxic
chemicals the West doesn't want
Alang represents a dilemma for India and the West. The worker exploitation and environmental contamination of the shipyards has to be weighed up against their economic importance. As the West debates the ethics and laws of this industry, can it or should it enforce its standards on developing nations such as India? After all, if shipbreaking hadn't been deemed too hazardous and expensive for the West, the industry wouldn't exist at all in India.0 -
The things we take for granted.... and the entitlement mentality...
What a country!0 -
quote:Originally posted by warriorsfan
quote:Originally posted by Captplaid
I've also heard claims that Asia's accident rate is much lower than Americas
Where did you hear that? THOUSANDS of miners die on the job each year in China. When a mine disaster happens here and a few miners die, it's big news. Over there, it's business as usual.
My former employer ADM, also known as "Another Dead Man".0 -
How do you think America's infrastructure was created? How many thousands died building the railroads, bridges, dams, canals, etc? China is where we were at the turn of the century, doing what we did then, and you now think it unfair. Maybe what we need is less OSHA, less Govt. regulation, less tax. What's good for the goose is good for the gander...quit yer bitchin'. 0 -
I think China has captured the pure spirit of capitalism and is most efficiently killing off the bloated carcasses of older capitalist societies. Until those aging capitalist societies are willing to compete with China on even terms they will continue to die off and the greater China Capitalism Experiment will continue to thrive. Most economists would encourage investors to invest in China. Their cheaper products are equal to or better than most union made products. Until the older capitalist societies embrace China's enlightened treatment of their labor force by forcing the spoiled laborers of their society to work for less and work longer hours they are destined for failure. Beach
P.S. If we really want to beat China we could halve the pay of unskilled American laborers and bring back the 6 day work week.Beach0 -
quote:
P.S. If we really want to beat China we could halve the pay of unskilled American laborers and bring back the 6 day work week.Beach
If you want to beat anyone, you have to play by the same rules, or make rules that favor you.
Right now, China's playing the game with the rules in their favor: No OHSA, no FDA, no NHTSA, no EPA, and no AFL-CIO or UAW.
The fact is, labor is dirt dirt dirt cheap in China (and India). I think the Indians have a better work ethic overall, but that is because they did not have a huge civil war resulting in a nutjob Communist dictator screwing things up (i.e. Mao's "Great Leap Forward" and "10000 Flowers Blooming" crap).
The USA simply cannot compete anymore. Why do you think GM moved most of their assembly plants to Mexico? There is no economy in paying a guy who puts screws in a door $50/hour when the real labor rate should be about $5/hour. Too bleening bad you have 3 kids to support, you should have gotten a degree instead of drinking all that beer.
Sorry folks, if you think CHina makes cheap (inexpensive) stuff, wait until there is a price war. You'll see how cheap they can go.
My company was bidding out parts for a device they make. The chinese reps kept meeting EVERY price update we put to them, and they would undercut it by 2-3% each time. No matter where we went to get competing bids, the CHinese company beat the price. Plus, they are an ISO-9000 and 9001 certified company!!
How can they do it? They just go back and tell the workers "you take less pay this week, if you don't like it go back to farm, now!"
Better teach your kids Chinese. Once those guys start really getting rich, they are going to buy up so much of the USA it's crazy. Look at how much China is already buying. If you think Japan in the 1980s was bad (buying up US property), think about the fact that China is 6 times bigger people-wise and tons bigger potential financially.
They don't need to invade, they'll just buy everything.
Hui tou jian! (See you later!)0 -
plautus....You've got it right. Until American firms move their business overseas we will not be able to keep up with the "New Wave" capitalists of Asia. Any American manufacturing firm that invests in American labor is destined for financial ruin. And of course there really is nothing wrong with learning Chinese. Beach 0 -
quote:Originally posted by beachmaster73
plautus....You've got it right. Until American firms move their business overseas we will not be able to keep up with the "New Wave" capitalists of Asia. Any American manufacturing firm that invests in American labor is destined for financial ruin. And of course there really is nothing wrong with learning Chinese. Beach
Actually, I am just intimating that US companies and workers need to adjust their expectations, that's all.
We could have 100% employment here in the US, and be a net exporter of products (including electronics) if salaries were in the $10-15/hour range.
Considering the level of skill involved in doing this kind of stuff (see Chinese labor above) $10-15/hour is quite generous.
It sucks, esp for the UAW worker with no college education who is making $55/hour putting doors on a car. But if he wants any job at all in the future (or one for his kids maybe) it's better to accept less than lose it all.
Seems to me there are plenty of places in the US where labor costs could be lower, but transport costs are still high (partially due again to labor in freight and forwarding services).0
Please sign in to leave a comment.
Comments
21 comments