Filed under: China, Communism, Empire, human rights, made in china, Microsoft, Oppression, slavery, socialism, sweatshops, third world | Tags: Acer, Foxconn, Hewlett-Packard, Logitech
Microsoft’s Chinese Workers Only Make $0.52 an Hour
Daily Mail
April 18, 2010
 The image Microsoft doesn’t want you to see: Too tired to stay awake, the Chinese workers earning just 34p an hour |
Showing Chinese sweatshop workers slumped over their desks with exhaustion, it is an image that Microsoft won’t want the world to see.
Employed for gruelling 15-hour shifts, in appalling conditions and 86f heat, many fall asleep on their stations during their meagre ten-minute breaks.
For as little as 34p an hour, the men and women work six or seven days a week, making computer mice and web cams for the American multinational computer company.
This photo and others like it were smuggled out of the KYE Systems factory at Dongguan, China, as part of a three-year investigation by the National Labour Committee, a human rights organisation which campaigns for workers across the globe.
The mostly female workers, aged 18 to 25, work from 7.45am to 10.55pm, sometimes with 1,000 workers crammed into one 105ft by 105ft room.
They are not allowed to talk or listen to music, are forced to eat substandard meals from the factory cafeterias, have no bathroom breaks during their shifts and must clean the toilets as discipline, according to the NLC.
The workers also sleep on site, in factory dormitories, with 14 workers to a room. They must buy their own mattresses and bedding, or else sleep on 28in-wide plywood boards. They ‘shower’ with a sponge and a bucket.
And many of the workers, because they are young women, are regularly sexually harassed, the NLC claimed.
The organisation said that one worker was even fined for losing his finger while operating a hole punch press.
Microsoft is not the only company to outsource manufacturing to KYE, but it accounts for about 30 per cent of the factory’s work, the NLC said. Companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Samsung, Foxconn, Acer, Logitech and Asus also use KYE Systems.
Microsoft, which exports much of the hardware made at the factory to America, Europe and Japan, said that it is taking the claims seriously and has begun an investigation.
One employee told the NLC: ‘We are like prisoners. It seems like we live only to work – we do not work to live. We do not live a life, only work.’
The NLC’s report included an account from one worker whose job consisted entirely of sticking self adhesive rubber feet to the bottom of Microsoft computer mice.
But the monotony of sitting or standing for 12 hours, applying foot after foot to mouse after mouse, was not the worst of the worker’s testimony.
It was the militaristic management and sleep deprivation that affected the worker most. ‘I know I can choose not to work overtime, but if I don’t work overtime then I am stuck with only 770 Chinese yuan (£72.77p) per month in basic wages,’ the worker said.
‘This is not nearly enough to support a family. My parents are farmers without jobs. They also do not have pensions.
‘I also need to worry about getting married, which requires a lot of money. Therefore, I still push myself to continue working in spite of my exhaustion.
‘When I finish my four hours of overtime, I’m extremely tired. At that time, even if someone offered me an extravagant dinner, I’d probably refuse. I just want to sleep.’
Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the NLC, said: ‘It sounded like torture – the frantic pace on the assembly line, same motion over and over for the 12 hours or more of work they did.’
Microsoft said it was committed to the ‘fair treatment and safety of workers’. A spokesman added: ‘We are aware of the NLC report and we have commenced an investigation.
‘We take these claims seriously and we will take appropriate remedial measures in regard to any findings of misconduct.’
Filed under: 2-party system, agriculture, Bill Clinton, bush, Colin Powell, corruption, Coup, DEBT, Dictatorship, Empire, food crisis, food shortage, food supply, France, George Bush, haiti, imf, left right paradigm, malthusian, Military, Military Industrial Complex, Naomi Klein, nation building, neocons, Neolibs, obama, occupation, reparations, slavery, sweatshops, third world, War Crimes, Woodrow Wilson, World Bank
U.S. Helped to Break Haiti for Over 200 Years
Common Dreams
January 17, 2010
Why does the US owe Haiti Billions? Colin Powell, former US Secretary of State, stated his foreign policy view as the “Pottery Barn rule.” That is – “if you break it, you own it.”
The US has worked to break Haiti for over 200 years. We owe Haiti. Not charity. We owe Haiti as a matter of justice. Reparations. And not the $100 million promised by President Obama either – that is Powerball money. The US owes Haiti Billions – with a big B.
The US has worked for centuries to break Haiti. The US has used Haiti like a plantation. The US helped bleed the country economically since it freed itself, repeatedly invaded the country militarily, supported dictators who abused the people, used the country as a dumping ground for our own economic advantage, ruined their roads and agriculture, and toppled popularly elected officials. The US has even used Haiti like the old plantation owner and slipped over there repeatedly for sexual recreation.
Here is the briefest history of some of the major US efforts to break Haiti.
In 1804, when Haiti achieved its freedom from France in the world’s first successful slave revolution, the United States refused to recognize the country. The US continued to refuse recognition to Haiti for 60 more years. Why? Because the US continued to enslave millions of its own citizens and feared recognizing Haiti would encourage slave revolution in the US.
After the 1804 revolution, Haiti was the subject of a crippling economic embargo by France and the US. US sanctions lasted until 1863. France ultimately used its military power to force Haiti to pay reparations for the slaves who were freed. The reparations were 150 million francs. (France sold the entire Louisiana territory to the US for 80 million francs!)
Haiti was forced to borrow money from banks in France and the US to pay reparations to France. A major loan from the US to pay off the French was finally paid off in 1947. The current value of the money Haiti was forced to pay to French and US banks? Over $20 Billion – with a big B.
The US occupied and ruled Haiti by force from 1915 to 1934. President n sent troops to invade in 1915. Revolts by Haitians were put down by US military – killing over 2000 in one skirmish alone. For the next nineteen years, the US controlled customs in Haiti, collected taxes, and ran many governmental institutions. How many billions were siphoned off by the US during these 19 years?
From 1957 to 1986 Haiti was forced to live under US backed dictators “Papa Doc” and “Baby Doc” Duvlaier. The US supported these dictators economically and militarily because they did what the US wanted and were politically “anti-communist” – now translatable as against human rights for their people. Duvalier stole millions from Haiti and ran up hundreds of millions in debt that Haiti still owes. Ten thousand Haitians lost their lives. Estimates say that Haiti owes $1.3 billion in external debt and that 40% of that debt was run up by the US-backed Duvaliers.
Thirty years ago Haiti imported no rice. Today Haiti imports nearly all its rice. Though Haiti was the sugar growing capital of the Caribbean, it now imports sugar as well. Why? The US and the US dominated world financial institutions – the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank – forced Haiti to open its markets to the world. Then the US dumped millions of tons of US subsidized rice and sugar into Haiti – undercutting their farmers and ruining Haitian agriculture. By ruining Haitian agriculture, the US has forced Haiti into becoming the third largest world market for US rice. Good for US farmers, bad for Haiti.
In 2002, the US stopped hundreds of millions of dollars in loans to Haiti which were to be used for, among other public projects like education, roads. These are the same roads which relief teams are having so much trouble navigating now!
In 2004, the US again destroyed democracy in Haiti when they supported the coup against Haiti’s elected President Aristide.
Haiti is even used for sexual recreation just like the old time plantations. Check the news carefully and you will find numerous stories of abuse of minors by missionaries, soldiers and charity workers. Plus there are the frequent sexual vacations taken to Haiti by people from the US and elsewhere. What is owed for that? What value would you put on it if it was your sisters and brothers?
US based corporations have for years been teaming up with Haitian elite to run sweatshops teeming with tens of thousands of Haitians who earn less than $2 a day.
The Haitian people have resisted the economic and military power of the US and others ever since their independence. Like all of us, Haitians made their own mistakes as well. But US power has forced Haitians to pay great prices – deaths, debt and abuse.
It is time for the people of the US to join with Haitians and reverse the course of US-Haitian relations.
This brief history shows why the US owes Haiti Billions – with a big B. This is not charity. This is justice. This is reparations. The current crisis is an opportunity for people in the US to own up to our country’s history of dominating Haiti and to make a truly just response.
(For more on the history of exploitation of Haiti by the US see: Paul Farmer, The Uses of Haiti; Peter Hallward, Damming the Flood; and Randall Robinson, An Unbroken Agony)
Naomi Klein Issues Haiti Disaster Capitalism Alert
noworldsystem.com 