The Human Cost of the Apple Supply Chain Machine (bloomberg.com) 175
Apple is still struggling to improve working conditions at its supply chain factories. China Labor Watch and Bloomberg reported on Tuesday that Catcher, a key supplier for iPhone and MacBook casings, makes workers endure harsh safety conditions and unfair work terms in a factory in Suqian. According to observers and discussions with workers, the machines are not only loud, but spray fluid and metallic particles that frequently hit workers' faces only some of which have access to safety goggles and gloves. From the report: Hundreds throng a workshop where the main door only opens about 12 inches. Off duty, they return to debris-strewn dorms bereft of showers or hot water. Many go without washing for days at a time, workers told Bloomberg. "My hands turned bloodless white after a day of work," said one of the workers, who makes a little over 4,000 yuan a month (just over $2 an hour) in her first job outside her home province of Henan. She turned to Catcher because her husband's home-decorating business was struggling. "I only tell good things to my family and keep the sufferings like this for myself." "I asked for the earplugs many times but they didn't have any. The loud noise of 'zah-zah' made my head ache and dizzy," one of those employees told Bloomberg.
Apple shamers (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm really tired of the Apple Shaming Society. It's like theres some group of people out there whjo make it their bussiness to rapidly notify all of us apple users or non-users that the company-that-can-do-no-wrong has a skid mark on it's shorts. Really were not thew naive. We don't exhalt apple to sainthood. It's a company that makes products we like or loath but it's not expected to be saintly. And most people even know that apple does go a mile further than most it is making sure it's foxconn suicide nets are secure and that the toxic effluent is at least mint flavored and made from recylced whale blubber not fresh kills.
Re:Apple shamers (Score:5, Insightful)
It's unfortunate this has been modded down into obscurity, because it's true.
When you go to the supermarket, do you find out the working conditions of your banana picker? Do people make sure the apple pickers have benefits? I'm from Nova Scotia's Annapolis valley where a lot of the apples in Eastern North America are grown and I will tell you that none of the greedy rich farm owners here pay more than a pittance for the pickers.
The responsibility for worker conditions lies squarely with the workers and the government of the country they live. Worker conditions aren't changed from the outside. People's conditions are changed when they stand up for themselves. The Magna Carta didn't happen when the French decided not to buy English exports. The 5 day 40 hour work week didn't happen when consumers stopped buying manufactured goods. They happen when people demand it.
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Back in the 1960s consumer boycotts of grapes and lettuce helped better conditions for farmworkers in the US, so, yes, enlightened individuals do inquire about the working conditions of those who provide their goods.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delano_grape_strike [wikipedia.org]
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and I will tell you that none of the greedy rich farm owners here pay more than a pittance for the pickers.
Comparing the life of an underpaid fruit picker to someone working an electronics production line shows that you either have no empathy for people or no clue at just how bad life is for the latter group.
Do your farmers put nets around their farm to stop their workers comitting suicide?
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When you go to the supermarket, do you find out the working conditions of your banana picker? Do people make sure the apple pickers have benefits? I'm from Nova Scotia's Annapolis valley where a lot of the apples in Eastern North America are grown and I will tell you that none of the greedy rich farm owners here pay more than a pittance for the pickers.
Actually, in some sense yes, I do. Although I'll agree that a lot of people buy the cheapest food they can find, and so the supply-chain care is unlikely to be as good in those sorts of supermarkets.
I'll bet a "worker on a pittance" in Nova Scotia looks like a king/queen compared to one in the factory talked about here. Most western nations have some minimum working/living conditions laws, but it seems China does not.
Back on topic: You bet Apple need to do something here. Sure, they might not have to do any
Annapolis valley (Score:2)
Squints suspiciously at you...
I'm also originally from there. Where abouts in the valley are you from?
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It sure does. The key difference is that this is Slashdot. Unlike Cartier or Walmart or China National Petroleum, Apple is the biggest urinator in our end of the pool.
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> Apple didn't pitch itself as the SJW's best friend
They do? Well... I must admit that I don't catch many Apple ads in the years since I've had a DVR. I'm pretty sure I haven't seen them mention "SJW"s in any that I've seen though. Perhaps you have links to the videos on YouTube that would support your claim?
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It's like theres some group of people out there whjo make it their bussiness to rapidly notify all of us apple users or non-users that the company-that-can-do-no-wrong has a skid mark on it's shorts.
We care because the president told us those factory jobs would soon be moving back to the states, and we want to ensure our local workers are safe. That person that jumped to their death from the factory window could be your mother or uncle in a year, or less.
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That person that jumped to their death from the factory window could be your mother or uncle in a year, or less.
Except that it won't be, and you know it.
When Mr. Trump says something, there is no reason to believe him, he says lots of things. Some of what he says can be understood, and some of the things he says are even nearly true, but "bringing manufacturing jobs back to the US" is not something anyone really believes.
Including Mr. Trump.
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We don't exhalt apple to sainthood.
Steve Jobs did, that's the point.
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People love to attack the top dog(s).
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2. Completely agreed that a lot the time this goes completely overboard. e.g. criticizing suicides at Foxconn, when Foxconn had a lower suicide rate than Americans of the same a
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More to the point; Apple is far from the only or first company to contract out to Foxxconn or Chinese manufacturing in general. Considering that we never seem to see stories on slashdot about the working conditions where Cisco or Microsoft or Acer or Netgear or HTC or Panasonic or Visio or Samsung or Fitbit or Huawei produces are made; I smell the distinct aromas of double standards and hypocrisy today.
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Please don't shame the apple apologists. They don't like it.
Re:Apple shamers (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple says it investigated claims, found no standards breached
When their obscene profit margin is dependent on NOT finding breaches, no breach shall be found.
FTFY (Score:1, Troll)
Apple is still struggling to give the impression that it gives a tinker's cuss about working conditions at its supplier chain factories.
FTFY
P.S. Supply chain, not supplier chain.
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And then there's the return phone call where the supplier explains how much more per unit that will cost Apple.
That is what they do (Score:2)
Apple can fix this problem with a single phone call that goes something like: "Fix these working conditions or our business is going elsewhere".
Apple has said repeatedly they move suppliers who do not meet their standards. The same goes here, if they do not improve Apple will find someone who can...
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I am sceptical about the accuracy of TFA. Jiangsu is one of the most prosperous provinces in China, and is within commuting distance of metropolitan Shanghai. These workers have plenty of other options, so if the conditions are really as horrific as described, why would they work there?
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Apple can fix this problem with a single phone call
Can, and won't.
Corporations will, by their nature, do what maximizes profits. Until the local laws change and they have to conform or be penalized, or until Apple's customers stop buying their products over it, things will continue as-is.
Anyone throwing their $1000 iPhones or their $3000 MBPs into the trash over this? No? Then nothing's changing.
Cut Apple some slack (Score:5, Funny)
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this is 100% true, wealth trickles down, so the bottom gets a penny (trickle) for each 1000$ unit.
now if we only had torrent down economics... but i think that's illegal.
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I heard that the wealth trickles down.
You joke, but in China, it did. Over the past 20-30 years we've seen the explosion of the Chinese middle class, and it all started with unskilled industrial jobs that brought people from the countryside into what are now megacities. A growing share of those new middle class households are starting to be able to afford iPhones of their own.
Victorian (Score:3)
19th century working conditions. If all countries had laws that required the selling company to prove that their workers are treated and paid humanely the world would look quite different. Which, of course, is exactly why this will never happen. Greed is good for too many people in high places.
Re: Victorian (Score:5, Insightful)
If all countries had laws that required the selling company to prove that their workers are treated and paid humanely ...
... the third world would spiral further into poverty and desolation thanks to rich western doogooders taking away their only competitive advantage: cheap labour.
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Or, they would be self-sustaining and not need the West to take away their assets for far too cheap because they are too expensive thanks to the labour laws.
Re: Victorian (Score:2)
Or, they would be self-sustaining
Yes, I suppose that living in the stone age is technically "self sustaining", but by that definition they're self sustaining now, too. Not sure what kind of change you're imagining, exactly.
Re: Victorian (Score:4, Interesting)
There is no reason most African countries would have to live in the stone age other than the fact that their resources and people have been repeatedly pillaged over thousands of years.
Right, because, say England, France, Germany, Japan, and South Korea were completely free from repeated pillaging for thousands of years. Nobody ever invaded them or took any of their resources.
When you have countries actively trying to keep them down it is rather difficult for me to stand there and make such a callous supposition such as yours.
The history of mankind is basically a constant struggle between tribes and nations "actively trying to keep others down". At different times in history different groups did it with different degrees of success, but to use that as a cop-out is incredibly naive. When African nations were raiding and pillaging Europe, nobody suggested that Europe would be a utopian wonderland if only those damn Africans would cut it the fuck out. When Vikings were raiding England, there was nobody blabbering about how those poor besieged Britons would be just fine if only everyone else would leave them alone.
The rise and demise of nations is an incredibly complex subject; it's a fools errand to try and isolate it down to simplistic causes. Anyone who pretends to have "the answer" is an ignoramus at best. And if that answer happens to be "isolationism" then you're a dangerous ignoramus as well.
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... the third world would spiral further into poverty and desolation thanks to rich western doogooders taking away their only competitive advantage: cheap labour.
iPhones are not cheap and the profit margins are huge. Adding a few cents to the cost to cover better conditions and pay for the workers isn't going to make Apple move the factory to somewhere else, because it will still be the cheapest place by far and they have the supply chain set up in China.
We say this with things like RoHS and environmental levies. Companies selling in the EU had to comply, they asked their Chinese manufacturing partners to comply, and things got better all round. The cost to the con
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... the third world
China isn't the third world.
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... the third world would spiral further into poverty and desolation thanks to rich western doogooders taking away their only competitive advantage: cheap labour.
I think you're confusing cause and effect. American wages were steadily increasing [wikipedia.org] until the liberalization of international trade, it's American wages being depressed to stay in competitive range of cheap labor from China, India and so on. If they demanded better pay and treatment US workers would increase their rates too while the 1% would make less profit. I mean seriously look at that red bar, "Real median weekly earnings of full time workers". The median is more representative of the typical American
Re: Victorian (Score:2)
I think you're confusing cause and effect. American wages were steadily increasing until the liberalization of international trade, it's American wages being depressed to stay in competitive range of cheap labor from China, India and so on.
It's both; wages in the US can't rise so much as to be uncompetitive, but neither can wages in other narrations. What ends up happening is that wages in the better-off nation (the US) rise relatively slowly, while wages in the worse-off nation (China) rise much more quickly. Eg. an increase of 50 cents per hour in the USA is offset by an increase of, say 25 cents per hour in China, but the latter makes a much more significant difference to the standard of living for the average Chinese worker than the for
Re: Victorian (Score:2)
No, I do not. Please explain to me how a moderate approach to wage increases is an argument for slavery.
Re: Victorian (Score:2)
Unless they stopped respecting the first world patents and copyrights, you know, like the US did to ascend.
They already do. The amount of knockoffs being pumped out of China and India is astounding, and when it comes to software and media use within their nations, the vast majority is pirated. Same goes for the rest of the third world; you can buy all the latest Hollywood blockbusters for $1 per disc in any Afghan market, but good luck finding a legit copy.
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The flip side of bad working conditions in China is a higher standard of living in USA. If US consumers had to pay the real cost of production lots of poor Americans would be living a poor Chinese lifestyle and lots of Middle Class Chinese would be living an American Middle Class lifestyle. Be careful what you wish for.
We've known about this for close to a decade now. (Score:1)
This is not new.
It doesn't take 10 years to fix this.
It's clear apple isn't really trying to fix it.
Especially for trivial inexpensive things like safety glasses and ear plugs.
The workers need to be able to sue Apple for disability.
THEN Apple will fix the problem.
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Re:We've known about this for close to a decade no (Score:5, Insightful)
Last time you bought something, did you check if everyone involved was being treated fairly? Are you responsible for all the production steps that happens when you buy anything?
Let's say you buy some Oreo cookies:
- where did all the ingredients come from? Was there any people or animals harmed? What about harm to the land itself?
- how was the packaging manufactured? Which method was used to procure the oil used to make the plastic packaging? Was it harmful to the environment?
- how much polution was produced to make the cookies, the packaging, transport it between the supplier and the warehouse, then the warehouse to the grocery store where you shop? And when you drove there to buy them and bring them back to your house?
Say what you want, but even if Apple are trying, they're only working via contracts with manufacturers. They can ask of them to adhere to certain standards, but the fact is that everything costs money. That's capitalism at work.
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And that is why we have governments.
To ensure people and animals are not being harmed.
And that's a problem with allowing companies in a country with one set of work standards to use .. say... human slaves in another country where slavery is legal.
If we don't stop slavery, and deadly working conditions for products sold in our country, then slavery and those working conditions will return to our country.
Apple isn't trying. Paying a third party to perform random inspections would be trivial to implement.
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Last time you bought something, did you check if everyone involved was being treated fairly?
In this case that person is Tim Cook who has the Billions laying around he could do worse than properly investigate. Hell hire me. I can solve this problem. How hard is it to walk into a factory and look around for children; workers rioting; basic safety conditions. I don't as a "ethical" consumer do those things. I simply boycott Apple products. If you don't you are part of the problem.
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Do you boycott 99% of all electronic products? Because they're almost ALL made in China.
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It's not a binary "I did nothing" vs. "I checked every human involved at every stage". If you buy a cheap widget on eBay for next to nothing you wouldn't expect much, but if you paid a huge amount of a high end phone from a company that claims to care about this stuff you might be forgiven for thinking that they make at least some effort.
And yes, I do pay a bit more for stuff I know was manufactured in good conditions some times. It's often worth it because stuff made in countries like Japan and Germany is
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Despite not having the resources to check personally, when it's brought to my attention that there are such problems, I avoid contributing to them wherever possible. For example, by not buying Apple products.
Let's be frank: Apple is a luxury brand. They are
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They can ask of them to adhere to certain standards,
Actually, what they can do is contractually require the manufacturer to adhere to the standards.
but the fact is that everything costs money. That's capitalism at work.
Absolutely! Did you know that the vast majority (>95% last I checked) of money spent on making an iPhone goes toward electronic components? Assembly is like 3% of the cost to make an iPhone. Apple sells them for 5x the cost of making it, so doubling the cost of assembly would literally be less than $5.
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Do they really use vegan sugar [peta.org], though?
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Not using that as an excuse, but Apple also does NOT pay workers $2/hour. They're using manufacturers who pay their workers $2/hour. There's also the problem of talking about hourly rates in foreign countries in US dollars.
I know it doesn't change anything for the workers in the end, but let's assign the blame where it belongs. Twisting facts is not a good way to debate subjects.
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Capitalism does not mean caring about abuses.
Capitalism means getting something for the lowest possible cost.
That's exactly what's happening here.
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wiling to bet that every single of bit of consumer electronics you own, have owned, or will own is made in very similar conditions.
Apple is not special in this case; they just make themselves an easy target by the price premium and dodgy tax shit they pull (which again, they are not special or unique in this regard)
iPhone X costs £1,000 (Score:2)
I thought that part of the reason for the high price was to be able to better pay those who make it.
Silly me.
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Nope. High prices only go to pay higher executive salaries and to compensate investors and stockholders.
Companies no longer view that they have any moral skin in the game.
Use child labor? Fine if it is more profitable.
Use child labor under conditions that blind people and kill several children a year? Fine if it is more profitable.
It's horrific. And if we don't stop it there, it is going to return to here.
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It never completely left here. Go visit a corporate farm at harvest time.
Let's be honest about this: (Score:1)
Before anybody gets on their high-horse over this, I am saying it's split evenly between BOTH APPLE AND CHINA. Apple would be charging $2000 for a goddamned iphone if they had to pay for U.S. wages and working
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Apple would be charging $2000 for a goddamned iphone if they had to pay for U.S. wages and working conditions
I'm hearing echos of "Lettuce would be $10/head if farmers had to pay decent wages." Of course, that isn't true; neither, apparently, is the assertion that the price of an iPhone would double if Apple had to pay for U.S. wages and working conditions. In both cases, the fraction of labor cost in production just isn't that large.
According to this [investopedia.com], the cost of labor for an iPhone 7 is $5.00 and material is $219.80, for a total manufacturing cost of $224.80. Selling price is $649 for the lowest version. You cou
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who has some very corrupt businesspeople who will do anything to make enough money
You just described every nation in the world.
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It's not just Apple. Pretty much any company that makes mass-produced products in China with razor thin margins is doing it this way. Blaming it all on Apple says more about the one throwing the stones than it does about the working conditions.
At least Apple is trying (Score:1, Insightful)
As bad as this is, what about Samsung case makers? Or any other computer for that matter? They are pulling even worse shit that you in your Apple Hatred are too blind to also point out, implying only Apple is to blame...
But Apple actually monitors and takes actions against bad suppliers. How many other companies do anything at all?
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Ah, SuperKendall. I knew I would find you here defending your employer. How's work going?
I am a Samsung Case Manufacturer (Score:1)
As bad as this is, what about Samsung case makers? Or any other computer for that matter? They are pulling even worse shit that you in your Apple Hatred are too blind to also point out, implying only Apple is to blame...
But Apple actually monitors and takes actions against bad suppliers. How many other companies do anything at all?
You can buy 3d-printed Samsung cases from many first world countries. You can even download a model and print one out yourself. Ironically the abuses by Apple, a company I boycott due to their human right abuses, anti consumer lobbying, media manipulation, anti greenpolicies and simply not producing good products. Shamefully Google keep trying to move manufacturing to the USA unlike Apple. In fact the raspberry pi is made in the UK in a Sony factory. As an ethical consumer I buy from these companies.
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Uh huh. And you typed this post on the pi? Cuz pretty much every computer and mobile devices you can buy is made by the same suppliers Apple uses, and it's been that way for a very long time.
Sounds more like you've been swept up in the
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Why do you say that Samsung is doing even worse, what is your evidence of that?
Samsung actually has factories of its own, many in Korea where the labour conditions are relatively good. They use other manufacturers in China as well for some stuff.
You say Apple monitors this, but clearly they didn't notice what was happening at this factory. Is there any evidence that they have people on the ground? I know they said they would do it, but did they go through with it?
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How many other companies do anything at all?
For all I know, most of them. Link your references otherwise.
There will always be complainants, isn't it? (Score:2)
No matter what an employer does, there will always be complainants. Even for Google, where many think is an utopia to work, has folks who complain. Heck, some have even quit...yet thousands keep applying to join.
Are we asking Tim to kinda randomly send scouts to these factories?
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Are we asking Tim to kinda randomly send scouts to these factories?
Actually, Apple actually already does that. They did over 700 comprehensive site audits (i.e. random inspections, interviews, the whole shebang) of their suppliers last year alone, and if you read the article they apparently conducted 150 interviews with employees at this particular factory as soon as they got wind of the impending report. What the summary leaves out that the article mentions is that Apple already addressed these issues publicly by saying that they found no evidence that the site was failin
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And that's your prerogative! Even though the evidence we have from recent history doesn't seem to bear out your opinion and your reason for holding that opinion bypasses any consideration of further evidence, it's still your opinion to hold.
As I said, however, there's quite a bit more to this story than the summary and headline suggest, much of which was addressed in the significantly less slanted article. It would've been nice if the summary had simply reflected the more neutral tone of the article, rather
Not possible (Score:5, Informative)
Everyone knows Asian people are short (Score:2, Funny)
but 12 inch doorways seem truly cruel
USA congratulates itself for working conditions (Score:3)
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Think of how bad the working conditions must be in general for jobs like this to be considered much better than the alternative options in China.
Many Americans don't have a clue how much better they have it compared to most of the rest of the world. Even most Western European countries are only as wealthy as say, Mississippi or Alabama in the U.S.
However, stopping free trade or making it contingent on some other country making laws similar to ours is literally one of the things (To be fair, there are many o
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The GP was probably referring to this analysis: If Sweden and Germany Became US States, They Would be Among the Poorest States [mises.org].
This analysis was based on median income (not mean or per capita income or GDP) to address concerns about wealth inequality, and takes into account social services, taxation, and cost-of-living. A glance at the second chart, the one adjusted for regional price parity, shows that adjusted median income in Louisiana—the poorest of the U.S. states—is higher than that in Fra
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The GP was probably referring to this analysis: If Sweden and Germany Became US States, They Would be Among the Poorest States [mises.org].
This analysis was based on median income (not mean or per capita income or GDP) to address concerns about wealth inequality, and takes into account social services, taxation, and cost-of-living. A glance at the second chart, the one adjusted for regional price parity, shows that adjusted median income in Louisiana—the poorest of the U.S. states—is higher than that in France, Ireland, and the United Kingdom, half of the OECD member states of Western Europe (as defined by the CIA), and also higher than the median incomes in Spain and Portugal, the two OECD countries in Southwestern Europe. The exceptions are Belgium (5.1% by population), Luxembourg (0.2%), and the Netherlands (7.6%).
In other words, 87% of the population of the OECD countries of Western and Southwestern Europe live in a country with a lower median income (including tax-funded social services) than the poorest U.S. state, after adjusting for cost-of-living.
Based on the above statistics, I feel that the GP was actually quite generous in comparing the wealth of most Western European countries to Mississippi or Alabama.
I don't quite agree with his figures though. Some 33 US states are at or below the US annual income per household per capita and another 4 are no more than $1000 above the US median and that includes wealthy California. It sounds to me as if Germany, Sweden and California are about on the same level in terms of per capita income and all are competitive high tech modern economies with a highly educated population. Also, if you are comparing Germany with Alabama you are comparing a country of 82 million peopl
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What you're still missing is purchasing power parity based on cost of living. You need to have both parts, both income and what that income will buy. There's a reason $50K in income would mean you're poor if you live in NYC while you'd be upper middle class in Mississippi.
Using JesseMcDonald's helpful reference, the countries you're comparing are lower once you compare PPP of the income. [blogspot.com]
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Yep, if you look at median income and include purchasing power, which is the best comparison.
Also, if you were to look at various measurements of things like housing size/quality, etc... you see some stark differences in how people actually live across various countries.
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mises.org, the Austrian economics advocacy group? Sure.
Your opinion of the Mises Institute in particular or Austrian economics in general is irrelevant, as the data speaks for itself. Those median income figures are direct from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the regional price parity data is from the U.S. Department of Commerce's Bureau of Economic Analysis—both very well-known (and not particularly Austrian) institutions.
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The Romans had Pax Romana (Latin for "Roman Peace"), which they extended to their conquests. No more wars. Good for society and business.
America should have a Pax Americana, where we extend our hard fought safe working conditions, environmental protections, and living wages to the rest of the world. If you do business with the largest economy, we expect you to abide.
It would be the best gift to the world of the true American dream.
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But then you'd lose your artificially high buying power and massive profit margins on selling things built in low-cost labour markets. The "American dream" depends on this exploitation to exist at all.
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Maybe free trade should be contingent on following practices similar to ours.
That was one of the ideas behind the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Trend (Score:2)
Just like folks export resource extraction like rare earth mining someplace else because it is dirty.
Just like German, and so I hear California shutting down nuclear power stations, but have zero problem buying the now deficient power from other places that produce it from nuclear power anyway.
It's basically just NIMBY at a global scale.
The insane part is walking around patting each other on the back like a job well done, when really they are just offloading whatever problem it is someplace else.
Form follows function (Score:2)
The Human Cost of the Apple Supply Chain Machine
As demonstrated in their upcoming HumancentiPad [wikipedia.org] product line.
Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
China makes these things by the 100s of millions. You mean they can't walk over to the factory next door and get a few pairs?
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too big to behave [Apple] (Score:1)
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Murray energy? (Score:2)
So they work under better conditions then you would at a Murray Energy Mine.
Apple doesn't give a crap (Score:2)
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Ignore the Russian troll sent here to make liberals look like baffoons.
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The wife works in a factory and the husband owns a home decorating business? Well THERE'S your problem.
In China, most factory workers are women. The men are back on the farm doing heavy labor. Most modern factory work requires dexterity, not strength.
But how far up the chain should Apple's responsibility go? Should they be responsible for the farmers that grow the rice served in the company cafeteria?
Re: Wait what? (Score:1)
As responsible as the customers want them to be. I personally wouldn't justify paying 1k + for a phone that took $2/hr to make. Especially not when the phone screams "overpriced pretentious tech built on exploited labor" to everyone around me. Sad thing is these workers can't even afford to send a sad face emoji on the iPhone X.
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Please. Apple makes BILLIONS in profit. You're simply trying to pass the buck. "It's not Apple's fault, they're a business!" Saying that they have to make a profit above any and all other considerations is bullshit.
Sorry, but people are going to pay attention to this kind of stuff, and they're going to ream Apple about it (though this kind of thing is not exclusive to Apple). That's the cost of doing business. Paying someone so low that it's pretty much slave labor isn't going to get you any gold medals.
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Don't shoot the company thats actually over there paying them. IF Apple voluntarily paid them more than it had to though, its management would be guilty of defrauding the shareholders, since they have a fiduciary responsibility to protect and maximize returns by negotiating the best possible deal.
Let me translate that from business-speak into English: "If you're a mere consumer and not a part-owner of Apple, you must not use the only tools available to you (i.e. buying someone else's product and telling the world why) to try to stop them making the world a shittier place."
Of all the players in this game, Apple is both the only one that we can persuade to make things better, and the one with the most power to change things because they have the power to dictate terms. It's not like the Chinese govern
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Maybe because you didn't grow up there you pretentious fuck.
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But how far up the chain should Apple's responsibility go?
Absolutely no higher than the bonuses that rewarded these choices.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
...Until is more fair?
It is not Apple's job to give everyone in the world the equivalent of an American middle-class lifestyle. $2 per hour is a fair wage in China, especially for an unskilled worker. It is not enough to afford an SUV and a four bedroom house with a white picket fence, but it is enough for a moped and a room in shared apartment, and with two adults working, and the grandparents providing childcare (normal in China), it is enough to support a family.
Re: (Score:2)
> we should proceed, automate all jobs possible to automate
Happening no matter how we feel about it.
> Would automation improve the lives of these people
Sure, if they own the factories or are a share-holder.
> potentially the only source of income available
Nonsense. The 0.001% will create demand for human ottomans, artists/poets/musicians, and a blowjob waiting list stretching halfway across shantytown. That or we'll employ three billion robot repairmen.
Seriouslytho, Prolekistan has ONE export and it