Shaming the wealthiest (known) man in the world for the business practices that helped make him that way is quite fair. The same things have been written about Apple.
... and nobody cares about an /r/Entrepreneurs guy drop-shipping some widget from China.
What's a fair wage for his employees? How much more would it be than what they are currently paid?
Are people entitled to wages higher than the prevailing market rate simply because their employer is capable of paying such wages? Do you really want to live in a world where employees of rich people get paid more than employees of more average people? The vast majority of workers would not be lucky enough to work for a really rich guy and would be paid less for the same work than the few who do. That seems less fair than everyone being paid the market rate.
> Do you really want to live in a world where employees of rich people get paid more than employees of more average people?
Are you really hinging the argument on a notion of fairness? If you're going to open that can of worms, you should also observe the systems within which these agents exist.
Yes living in dormitories and working sixty hour weeks with no overtime and causing permanent physical damage to yourself because of the repetitive nature of your work and having no choice but to work for a company which breaks the labor laws of the nation in which it exists all in order to further enrich the wealthiest person in the world is very fair.
People line up outside the factory to apply for those jobs because they are an improvement over their current living conditions.
I suspect many of those people would be angry if self-righteous people in first-world countries made it more difficult to get those jobs, which is the effect that higher wages would have.
You seem to be approaching this from some sort of market optimization perspective where a race to the bottom is a good thing.
Consider what might happen if Amazon paid their workforce 5% more than their competitors instead of paying bottom dollar. Competition for that higher wage would improve the quality of their workforce (and then produce a higher quality product). Other employers would them also compete to get quality workers.
From the standpoint of fairness, why should a worker at Company A make more than someone who does the same job at Company B, simply because the owner of Company A is richer than the owner of Company B? That's what I don't like.
I'm sure Amazon would be willing to pay more to well-qualified workers than to less-qualified workers. But that's not the type of argument I was responding to. The parent comment suggested that Bezos should pay his employees more simply because he can afford to.
I don't see how it's reasonable to base employee wages on the wealth of the company owner -- if Amazon stock tanked and Bezos lost a lot of money, should he cut employee wages? If not, then why should he increase wages when his personal wealth increases? It would be better for employee wages to be based on the employee's skills, not the employer's personal financial circumstances.
Company A can't directly increase the pay of workers at Company B. But A can increase the pay of it's own workers, making it more desirable than working for B. The increased competition on the labor market requires B to raise their wages as well. All workers win.
The equilibrium may still not end up with A and B paying the same, but personally I care more about everyone having enough than everyone having the same, so even unequal wage increases are a positive in my book.
> Jeff Bezos is literally the richest human being on Earth. If anyone could afford to pay his workers a fair wage, it's him.
Actually it wouldn't be so simple. Amazon is one of the lowest margin businesses on earth. The vast majority of Bezos' wealth is in Amazon's overpriced stock.
It wouldn't really be possible to pay workers a larger wage both from his wealth, seeing as its stock, nor from cutting margins further.
He could liquidate his net worth and give 18 dollars to each person in the world. There's no reason to give more to people in his supply chain. Nor does he have a duty to give these people free money. Besides, making an efficient machine for transmitting their goods to a customer has already benefited the manufacturing employee by increasing their wages.
> If anyone could afford to pay his workers a fair wage, it's him.
It's not his workers. It'S Foxconn. Is Bezos also responsible for the livelihood of the people who mine the rare metals in the poorest countries? By this logic this is a never ending chain of responsibilities.
Subsistence farming isn't so bad of a life, compared to 60 hour factory weeks. Lots of western elites see something like that as a luxurious retirement.
I personally don't want to participate in a slave economy.
Tell that to the former subsistence farmers who show every indication of preferring assembly work. Life as a subsistence farmer is much worse than you can imagine. We know this because people overwhelmingly prefer factory work, even in terrible conditions.
>Subsistence farming isn't so bad of a life, compared to 60 hour factory weeks.
Wanna bet? Why do you think rural populations leave as soon as they are able and move to cities to work in factories.
> Lots of western elites see something like that as a luxurious retirement.
The bigger stereotype is rich westerners fetishizing harsh rural life - the kind of life they aren't willing to participate in but have no problem advocating for for the poor in developing nations.
Some of them do, many, but not all. Surely some are surprised by the expectation vs reality of their new lives.
I have spoken to many "rich westerners" about my (also western, not poor but rural) upbringing and gotten responses which were longing for that sort of life. It is possible to live very well by a certain standard, on a small amount of land by doing most of the things you need for yourself. There are a lot of people who want that instead of their city life. Not for others but for themselves.
Very few people who didn't experience something like it have any idea at all what it might be like.
>I have spoken to many "rich westerners" about my (also western, not poor but rural) upbringing and gotten responses which were longing for that sort of life.
I bet. There is a romanticization of a back-to-basics lifestyle. But western farming is nothing like 3rd world subsistence farming.
>It is possible to live very well by a certain standard, on a small amount of land by doing most of the things you need for yourself.
There is a hidden assumption underneath your statement, namely that you have ready access to electricity, indoor plumbing, modern healthcare, and generally typical western infrastructure. So what you're describing is either cottage living, or a hobby farm. Those are nothing like 3rd world subsistence farming.
Thats basically a tariff against developing countries you are asking for. How do you think the West got rich in the first place? With 30 hours work weeks?
I agree with ekianjo in this sentiment, although we can pass some of our lessons to developing nations, preventing tragedies like the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.
Development doesn't happen immediately, but it can happen fairly rapidly (50 years for Korea vs 200+ for the US).
>How do you think the West got rich in the first place?
By increasing productivity through industrialization and technology advancements, and by doing those things before the rest of the world. (and by having economic systems that accomplished this faster/more effectively than others, possibly also as the result of plagues that decimated the population a few times)
A lot of things happened that made the west wealthy in comparison with the rest of the world. Plague also didn't just happen once, it was a continuous thing with a few large events.
The reduction in population of some of those epidemics made fairly large improvements in the survivors' lives and can be seen as the stimulus in a lot of the progression of Europe.
Progress that led to wealth in the west wan't just the industrial revolution(s), it started long before and was the effect of several technological and social developments.
>> By increasing productivity through industrialization and technology advancements, and by doing those things before the rest of the world.
You seem to be ignoring the human labor part that happened around then and the backbreaking work that they did. Robots didn't get it done nor did the 40 hour work week.
Increases in productivity would have been _faster_ with shorter work weeks, but would have been detrimental to the wealth concentration such is the cost of capitalism. Reduction of hours is, to a point, a source of growth.
> By increasing productivity through industrialization and technology advancements
yes, but if you think your great-great grandparents had it easy, well you should ask around and read books written around that time. I think you forget the standards for everyone was just plain misery not long ago.
I have actually read a bit about how one of my great-great grandfathers lived, and it didn't seem he was miserable and could arguably be said to be better off.
More to the point though, the question was how the West got rich. I was talking about the last ~1000 years, maybe a little less, of history in the western world and how their development led in part to the differences in development today. What that has to do with how many ancestors 100 years ago were miserable or not doesn't really connect.
Taking on that subject though, I have this idea that people regardless of situations are on a grand scheme equally miserable. Whether living in a cave 20,000 years ago or a New York penthouse, if you had a way to quantify misery I doubt you would be able to find a significant discrepancy. (corollary: much of the depression and other mental illnesses experienced today are a result of the drastically different environment and set of hardships experienced compared to the ones we evolved in)
The West was still pretty poor even 200 years ago. Going back 1000 years ago makes no difference. Economic development and the fact that almost everyone benefited from it in the West is very, very recent History.
>How do you think the West got rich in the first place? 30 hour work weeks?
By profiting on other people’s labor time; not their own.
But it also just happens that, in the US, 30 hours is just the right amount to forgo providing benefits and job security, so your proposal was not that far off.
> By profiting on other people’s labor time; not their own.
Certainly not. During the early ages of industrialization, workers made a better living in the cities than in the countryside, but had to work a lot for it too.
No, this is a false justification, since "The West" is not just the US, and many other western countries had abolished slavery for a long time already before becoming really rich. So, your claim is just wrong.
I recently visited Stanley Mills, on the river Tay just outside Perth in Scotland. It's now a fascinating museum, and focuses on the history of the cotton mill and its workers.
In the early 1800s the mill employed 885 workers. 540 were female and 497 were children as young as seven. Their working day started at 5:30am, 45-minute breakfast at 9:00am, 45-minute dinner at 2:00pm and work finished at 7:00pm. Children finished at 3:15pm to attend the company school.
The Factory Act, passed in 1833, changed how the mill treated its workers. The act restricted working hours and also prohibited employment of children under nine.
All for labor standards here, but I think you doing a disservice to dirt, something many Native Americans understand as one of the only things they have left.
You should read The Dictator's Handbook. Tariffs and Foreign Aid server one purpose: to help democracies impose non-democratic policies in those countries.
The US/EU/UK give foreign aid to States with resources they want. Thereby keeping autocrats in power (they take a huge cut of that aid; people typically get the scraps after they pay off essential supporters and generals).
Foreign policy is always about resource management and almost always helps keep autocrats in power. When the nation runs out of resources and aid is cut, it typically promotes democratization because the leader can no longer pay supporters. They have to appeal to the people and increase the influence selectorate size. If they don't and the people rise up, they'll often win if the leader doesn't find a way to pay the police/army.
States (both democratic and autocratic) exist because they have a monopoly on violence. Foreign aid really only helps autocrats maintain that monopoly.
Most places with autocrats have no tradition of democracy and removing the autocrats often leads to civil war. This has been a recurring theme in Africa over the last half century. The West has made some disastrous foreign policy decisions, but I think the idea that we keep autocrats in power solely to extract foreign resources is not supported by the evidence.
Also, here's a list of recipients of US foreign aid[0]. I don't see an obvious connection between material wealth and amount of aid spent.
While I don't doubt much of this has truth, it's a bit of a one dimensional look at foreign and trade policy. Nothing world powers do has "one purpose". Motivations, intentions, and outcomes are manifold.
States don't exist because they have a monopoly on violence, it is just that a (at least semi-) monopoly on violence is a core trait of a state. Statehood is the evolutionarily stable outcome of any geographic population so far. An area without a state will, without exception, develop one.
People without savings, or who have dependents, might not have the ability to leave their jobs for the time that would be needed to retrain in alternative work. Or for that matter, bargain for better conditions.
Richer people with savings or parental support will always be able to quit & search for better work; and no doubt that’s where this arrogant ‘go and search for another job then’ sentiment comes from.
Note that China doesn’t have effective social security, so retraining isn’t an option.
I think the idea is that a company with enough money (who hasn't done something that people would viscerally consider horrible) can influence enough people through advertising that the well-informed consumers "voting with their dollars" don't make a meaningful difference.
Is it really advertising that's at fault here? OP has a big issue with WalMart. I don't have a problem with WalMart at all. WalMart is an inevitability in a world where selection pressure rewards increased efficiency and lower costs. The most natural way to achieve that is through scale and centralization. But OP is clearly ideology driven and has a warped view of WalMart as some sort of super villian, that most normal people don't. He is confused why nobody follows him in his boycott and scapegoats advertising.
I would, in general, recommend cancelling Prime. You can get better deals often elsewhere, so you might as well remove the default-to-Amazon behavior Prime gives you. You can still order on Amazon with free shipping for orders over $25 anyways. And Walmart will do free two-day shipping for orders over $25, making Prime mostly useless. Add some ship to store options for Target and Best Buy... There's nice non-Prime options out there.
Be honest.. although not always the cheapest.. Does anybody keep your credit card safer than Amazon online? And who wants to sign up for a new account with some random company. If the shit hits the fan, Amazon will cover me as a customer.
1. Amazon has a HUGE scamming problem right now. Fraudulent listed items are a big deal, combined with legitimate listings, so it's hard not to get suddenly overcharged or sold a cheap knockoff. Your credit card number might be safer, but your actual money probably isn't.
2. You're not responsible for fraudulent charges, so worrying about major retailers having your credit card number isn't really reasonable. I don't recommend saving your credit card in any store website. Enter it each time so they can't store it.
You can do a search for "Is Prime Worth It" and there are a couple of journalist that break down average purchases vs using the free three day shipping. Unless you purchase a lot of things and use a lot of services (video/music streaming) it doesn't seem worth the price for the average consumer. Most people lose money on it, but they stay subscribed because they've had it for years.
A tariff or tax regime indexed on real wages and also environmental protection is necessary.
Selling things in the USA profitably on the basis of cheap labor in countries with weak environmental and labor protection should not be so simple.
A tariff program is probably not even necessary because overwhelmingly American corporations can simply be taxed for their import activities in a VAT manner and the problem goes away.
I think they’re referring to Jamiroquai, maybe the album “Automaton” in particular.
Jay Kay described the inspiration for Automaton: "in recognition of the rise of artificial intelligence and technology in our world today and how we as humans are beginning to forget the more pleasant, simple and eloquent things in life and in our environment including our relationship with one another as human beings"
I wonder if there's market for ethical electronics. Basically buy the same electronics and sell them at higher price and give the money to the people working at said factories. If there was legit proof that the money is going where it should, I would totally pay like 15-20% extra.
It would involve removing planned obsolescence. An ethical cellphone would be one where every part is user serviceable and standardized. The Fairphone is having trouble even keeping manufactures producing stock for their older phones. There is so much value in keeping people replacing their devices every two years that I doubt we'll see PC/ATX style standardization in mobile hardware.
Mobile has size and environmental constraints that exceed PC/ATX by a considerable amount. One could imagine that as transistor scaling slows and lithium ion density approaches it's limit, a modularized standard evolves.
> Might be harder to have disposable culture with high wages though
How so?
If anything, I would be more inclined to buy the latest and greatest tech every year if I had more money to spend. I think most consumers would do the same.
You'd need to be able to replace the SoC, the screen, the cameras, and the biometric sensors to prevent a phone from becoming obsolete within a few years. That's pretty much all of the expensive parts of the phone, and it would likely cost the same as just buying a new one.
An ethical cell phone would be easy to disassemble and recycle with a minimum of toxics. Building user serviceable phones isn't practical with current technology sure to the high level of component integration.
Would you pay 200% extra? I imagine the markup for “ethical” tech is more or less closer to that than to a slightly higher shipping cost (15% or so), based on prior hardware-related projects I’ve been involved with
I wonder at one point Bezos will start giving back. Will he became a Bill Gates or be more like Larry Ellison? At the moment it seems more the later...
It's maybe early yet to talk about what Bezos is going to do with his fortune; Amazon isn't all-grown-up yet. It's still possible he's going to go in the Gates direction, and I think it's much to early to say he's going in Ellison's direction.
But that doesn't make everything we like him doing an act of philanthropy.
It really is a worthwile endevor to move humanity forward, invest is space, etc., At the same time, with his wealth he could single handedly eradicate world hunger and still hang out with the world's richest.
At a bare minimum he could pay the people who have generated his wealth for him a little better.
I wonder at what point will we stop thinking of Bill Gates as Robin Hood in the flesh.
What is the difference between Bill Gates “philanthropy” and a corporate PR campaign? For example, why is “philanthropy” promoting MasterCard across Africa a great way to address inequality? It appears to have had opposite effects in the US. But even if it were effective: philanthropy?
I appreciate the skepticism and perhaps credit belongs more with Melinda than Bill but it is hard to overstated the impact of the Gates Foundation in the world of aid. Seriously, I work in that world and their influence is both good and pervasive. It doesn't excuse previous behavior, but judged independently their impact has been absolutely enormous.
> Most earn between 2,000 and 3,000 yuan, with permanent staff earning between 2,000 and 2,500 yuan. In 2017, the average wage for a worker in Hengyang was 4,647 yuan a month.
And thanks to the guardian, we (the consumers) can choose companies that pick factories that treat their workers ethically. Lest we lose our moral high ground.
Let's say this is true, i.e. there is no motivation for a corporation to maximize anything other than profit. What if the relevant government body (EPA, OSHA) attaches a social cost or a rating to each corporation and that is factored into the tax rate?
This is not true. Social licence directly affects share-price. The bulk of most public shares are hold by other public companies. For example my superannuation company invests my payments in its portfolio that portfolio is under constant review and have to tick a number of social responsibility boxes, that process is part of its charter, and the charter is the reason I invest in this company.
I work for a big mining company, 'social licence' is discussed at board level. Now most of that may very well be corporate bullshit, but the impact of social responsibility perception amongst the owners (shareholders) on share price is clear.
Compare this to India, where you could be a daily wager working 14-16 hours days, no weekends, no benefits, on something that might be back-breaking, hazardous, and pays just enough to get by. Your employer could abuse you, dock your pay, and would barely spend anything to make your job safe. Work might include cleaning swears without any safety gear, labouring under a sweltering 45C weather, or working in hazardous factories.
I am not espousing the inhuman treatment of these workers. However, for many people in India and around the world, this would be an order of magnitude improvement of their lives. I think China is on the right track. The working conditions would get better as the economy grows. The injustice might seem appalling, but have you wondered what the alternative is?
Even when you include the part you conveniently left out about the poor living in even worse conditions that make their current situation a far better option?
Do you really think they were pulled from a cozy office doing 9 to 5 to this?
Where do you think wealth comes from? It is the product of knowledge and institutions and economic growth. It is not always off the backs of others. In fact most of it is not. We are about a hundred times wealthier than we were before the industrial revolution. We can’t have stolen this wealth as not the smallest fraction of it existed in all the world before the industrial revolution.
If we deny these people the prospect of working in factories we are doing them no favours. How is removing demand for their labor going to make them wealthier?
It is not the sweatshops fault these people are poor. It is their poverty that makes a job you find unappealing appealing for them. By all means lobby to increase foreign aid. By all means donate cash via Give Directly.
But don’t think for a moment you are enriching these people’s lives by reducing the demand for their labor. Such thoughts are economic insanity.
> It is their poverty that makes a job you find unappealing appealing for them
What? these inhumane working conditions aren't appealing to any human. Nobody is asking to reduce the demand for their labor, maybe the product should be priced accordingly to facilitate good working conditions and pay instead.
Most of those people wouldn’t have gone to the city if they could have stayed on their farm. It’s capitalism forcing those people from their land, not some innate desire to be exploited in a factory.
From paying labor less than it’s worth and keeping the difference for yourself.
People use sweatshop labor because they can steal even more of the value created by these worker’s labor, knowing there’s not a damn thing they can do about it. And they’ve done so for so long, amassed so much wealth, that they now can pay for boatloads of “intellectuals” to justify their exploitation as good and necessary, leading to us having this conversation now.
I am going to recommend a book to you. Doing Good Better by William MacAskil. It is not a work of right wing “intellectuals”. It is a book I think may cause you to rethink things. In exchange, I will read any book you recommended, Marxist or otherwise.
I’m aware of the rehabilitations of the Effective Altruism movement and find their arguments unconvincing. Not to mention entirely the product of right-wing TINA thinking.
Am I right in assuming you consider communist revolution the only solution? Just so you know it is unlikely you will be the Stalin of that eventuality, just one more of his slaves.
No, not at all. I believe in democracy and its potential for transformation above all, just as a fundamental right in the workplace/economy, in addition to government.
In this case it's very clear where wealth comes from: Bezos and the rest of the Amazon shareholders are severely underpaying these workers in violation of China's labor laws. Did you read the article?
> We can’t have stolen this wealth as not the smallest fraction of it existed in all the world before the industrial revolution.
The capacity for self-deception is always a bit surprising. Confronted with a clear and concrete case of labor exploitation and wage theft you insist, never the less, it is not labor exploitation and wage theft. That is economic insanity.
> How is removing demand for their labor going to make them wealthier?
There's no need to appeal to vague self-serving questions. The impact of labor standards on global trade have been studied and their impact can be quantified. Here, in particular, the California Effect [1] has been proven to be very effective in increasing labor and environmental [3] standards around the world. California alone could likely help here a lot by demanding regulatory advertising on these products. The first step would be to educate American consumers so they understand the enormous suffering that goes into these products.
Neither Amazon nor Bezos do not py them directly. They pay Foxconn for assembled devices. If they paid more, Foxconn would probably just have better margins.
Who's wealth are you revering to, those that own the knowledge and institutions,
or those that do the work ? In modern democracies we used to try and, what do
you know, 'democratise' wealth. In the last year 81% of the wealth created went
to 1% of people. This is why capitalism is failing humanity, and why it will be
rejected.
The vast bulk of 'wealth' is generated by perpetual rent-seeking by those that
maintain artificial scarcity. There are exceptions of course, and most of those
are to be found in new technologically driven enterprises.
> We can’t have stolen this wealth as not the smallest fraction of it existed in all the world before the industrial revolution.
Ummmm evidence? Is there an article or study or book which backs this idea up?
This sounds like one interesting idea (the wealth production enabled by ideas, knowledge, systems, etc) coupled with a big dose of denial of reality, namely, the exploitation (of natural resources in Africa, India, and the americas, and of human labor and lives via slavery) which allowed the industrial revolution to come into being.
Plus, the article mentions how other regions in China such as Shenzhen _do_ have better labor practices. It’s not a binary choice between zero opportunity and abusive sweatshops.
I mean Capital owners, which includes Bezos and a few strata below him. Everyone else is labor, whether they’re an Indian sweatshop worker or a startup employee.
The way I see it, this is transitory stage and future might be better for these workers. Capitalism is exploitive, and until better opportunities emerge, they will be squeezed for maximum work. However, I can't think of anything better way for 1.3B people to progress.
You cannot compare work environment at Amazon to that of unorganized sector in India where small organizations or agriculture land-owners in villages and small towns exploit employees. Being a modern technology company, Amazon should be held to better standards. If there is not enough awareness and pushback against Amazon or Apple, you can't expect anything to change in unorganized sector and small-town practices.
Wait a second... Why? I guess I don't get the double standard. You say the double standard is necessary for conditions to improve but can we discuss that a bit, because it isn't obviously the case. If it is an important human rights issue, I'm not sure anyone should get a pass. And if it is just, you think Amazon should be the best bad job in town, I don't see why they need to.
No one is getting a pass. But the methods to tackle workers exploitation at Amazon or a big corporation is very different than tackling the abuse of daily wage workers in India that the OP of the comment talks about. In the former case, corporations and users of their products are solely responsible for the employment conditions and can be tackled by raising your voice. But in the latter case, the source of exploitation is decentralized. The sector is unorganized and it is very difficult to implement the law strictly, even if there is are strong laws to prevent such. So justifying the conditions of the employees in the former case by comparing it to that of latter doesn't make sense.
A lot of people here are saying that although their poor working conditions are unfortunate, those jobs are better than whatever alternative they would've otherwise had. However if those same workers were U.S. citizens in the United States, then for whatever reason a lot of you would then take it more seriously.
Morality should not be restricted by geographic borders.
It's just not a company's job to care about morality, only to optimise to maximise gain. It's the law's job.
Saying this is not taking sides or being "cynical" or "capitalistic". The point is if you want change you have to FIGHT to change laws and make them be enforced (through lawsuits / unions). It's always a power struggle and you'll stay on the weak side if you keep screaming "morality" at corporate entities and rely on their good will to enforce workers right... Saying otherwise is deluding other people and/or yourself of reality, but i guess it feels good to feel on "the right side" without actually doing anything.
source: many family members in unions who fought for their rights in france
However morality suggests you should blame the party that caused the damage. Are working conditions poor in China due to the Chinese government which starved 15 million people to death as recently at 1960 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine), or due to Amazon paying people to make Kindles?
Not for whatever reason - in fact, US citizens would have a different stance about US workers conditions because they have both the responsibility and the authority (due to their sovereignty) to dictate the working conditions of their fellow countrymen.
Since Chinese people won't grant us the same authority, we shouldn't have the same responsibility and hence our position will be necessarily different.
(Same goes for any other pair of countries; eg Germany and Vietnam or France and Bangladesh)
I have very mixed feelings about working conditions in emerging economies. It feels good to single out Amazon but all of us who own a smartphone or own part of the S&P 500 benefit from this reality as well.
It's hard to understand why people choose to put others in these conditions. For example, who makes the decision not to pay overtime and why? It will save one dollar and thirteen cents an hour. What could this possibly amount to, in the cost of a Kindle?
Perhaps this is due entirely to the race to bottom inspired by competitive pressure -- the various bidders all trying to find a way to offer Amazon the lowest bid -- or perhaps it is due to internal pressures, where managers can be rewarded for finding savings that are significant relative to the cost of a certain phase in the process, even if it is of little consequence for the cost of the final device.
Ultimately if consumers will support these business models, there will always be a Bezos willing to sell to them, at whatever the human cost.
Slap some pretty marketing around your product and most consumers are blissfully ignorant. Certainly helped by global-scale supply chains that add a fog of war.
Even those who are aware of it, in many cases, fall prey to "that's a pity" thinking without actually changing their own habits. Like a crowd of folks walking by litter - many shake their heads, but few actually pick it up.
Have you omitted all such products from your own life? Good for you if so, but few of us can make such a claim.
Tl;dr: Runaway optimization processes erode "sacred" or non-economic values in all environments without a central coordinating authority cognizant of and opposed to the problem. But do read the article; I can't do it justice in a summary.
Imho part of it is that responsibility for the choice is distributed. This makes it easy for everyone (including us Kindle buyers) to say to themselves “it’s not my fault and I’m just going along with what is.”
Maybe then the solution relates to that, as well. Just choosing not to buy Kindle won't, as an uncoordinated action, make any difference. Even if it were coordinated, not doing something doesn't generally paint a picture of what exactly to do. We want Kindles to be made, and we want people to be treated well in doing so, and we have no idea how to organize for such a thing to happen.
Leaking roof and broken bathroom light at their dorm? The investigator should really go check the workers living condition at home to know it’s already an improvement. Don’t hold the same western labor standards to the Chinese manufacturers, give them time and guidance to do better, and most importantly do not take the workers jobs away.
I find these articles more likely to make me numb to actual abuses because they're so one dimensional and banal.
At the end of the day, these are of the highest paying jobs in the country. "Fair pay" is highly relative and these jobs are slowly and surely helping to build up the Chinese middle class.
Progress is slow, and simply trying to graft the standards of Western societies onto places way behind is tone deaf to reality. Chinese PPP actually higher than USA which considering where the country was only 50 years ago should be seen as a great accomplishment http://www.ibtimes.com/china-economy-surpasses-us-purchasing...
This article is just a hit piece void of any actual economics because it's hip to hate on rich people, in particular one who got there by grinding out efficiency at a desk made from 2x4 for years before the success started.
Hell, when I was 16 working in a kitchen finally making money I did everything I could to get overtime and my goal was hitting 60 hours a week.
These countries will change at their own pace, and Bezos or Apple aren't evil for being of the best jobs in a given country.
Foxconn and similar manufacturers are always the favorite topic for western media. But the reality is complicated. The bottom line is that in most cases there's no slave labor taking place and nobody forces those workers to stay there. I have a relative who works in a Foxconn factory in Sichuan. She had a lot of other jobs before. She works there not because he's being forced like a slave or whatnot, but simply because Foxconn pays very good salaries compared to other options that she has (this manufacturer in Hengyang might be underpaying but this does not automatically mean that every factory does the same).
Yeah, the hours are very long compared to western standards. I also much prefer the way the Europeans find work-life balance. But that is because you are already a very rich society and you can afford that. Also there is also a cultural and historical difference. In China, or Korea, or Japan, wherever in East Asia, working long hours is very normal, be it for low-level workers or high-level executives. This is just a part of the culture. Without it, how could China which was so poor 40 years ago become rich and powerful again this fast? Even the US is much more workaholic than Europe, without the mandatory one-month holiday etc. If you imagine that Foxconn workers are subjected to slave-like treatments as if they were in a plantation or a mine, you can't be further from facts. Yes, I personally prefer to have a better work-life balance, but that's because I can already make the choices. For many underprivileged populace in China, working for Foxconn is the best possible opportunity they can get.
Of course I also do acknowledge that even though there's no essential slavery the work conditions can and shall be improved, especially now that China has got a lot richer already. In a sense the industrialists during the industrial revolution can also argue that they were not really forcing workers into "slavery", but the workers had actually no choice whatsoever since every workplace was the same (the modern Chinese factories are definitely much better than those places in the 18th century though). Anyways just wanted to offer a different perspective here. If you actually go there and talk to most of the workers I believe you'd hear a similar answer to that offered by my relative, i.e. they just want to save up some money when they can and this opportunity is as good as it can get under the current social circumstances. They'll likely return to their hometown to start something else after working such a job for a while. I do also believe that the accelerating social inequality in China is a problem that has to be addressed and there should be many more opportunities for the poor. But that's in a way similar to what's happening in the US and not something fundamentally/qualitatively different.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 173 ms ] threadShaming the wealthiest (known) man in the world for the business practices that helped make him that way is quite fair. The same things have been written about Apple.
... and nobody cares about an /r/Entrepreneurs guy drop-shipping some widget from China.
Are people entitled to wages higher than the prevailing market rate simply because their employer is capable of paying such wages? Do you really want to live in a world where employees of rich people get paid more than employees of more average people? The vast majority of workers would not be lucky enough to work for a really rich guy and would be paid less for the same work than the few who do. That seems less fair than everyone being paid the market rate.
> Do you really want to live in a world where employees of rich people get paid more than employees of more average people?
Are you really hinging the argument on a notion of fairness? If you're going to open that can of worms, you should also observe the systems within which these agents exist.
Are you going to respond to the actual argument, or are you just going to be insulting?
Any argument about fair wages is going to hinge on notions of fairness.
I suspect many of those people would be angry if self-righteous people in first-world countries made it more difficult to get those jobs, which is the effect that higher wages would have.
And, I challenge you - find an interview with a Foxconn factory worker from a reputable news source, and let’s what they say. I am genuinely curious.
Consider what might happen if Amazon paid their workforce 5% more than their competitors instead of paying bottom dollar. Competition for that higher wage would improve the quality of their workforce (and then produce a higher quality product). Other employers would them also compete to get quality workers.
I'm sure Amazon would be willing to pay more to well-qualified workers than to less-qualified workers. But that's not the type of argument I was responding to. The parent comment suggested that Bezos should pay his employees more simply because he can afford to.
I don't see how it's reasonable to base employee wages on the wealth of the company owner -- if Amazon stock tanked and Bezos lost a lot of money, should he cut employee wages? If not, then why should he increase wages when his personal wealth increases? It would be better for employee wages to be based on the employee's skills, not the employer's personal financial circumstances.
The equilibrium may still not end up with A and B paying the same, but personally I care more about everyone having enough than everyone having the same, so even unequal wage increases are a positive in my book.
The justification for the wages being the wages is that that IS what the open market decided.
I was not aware Kindles were poorly assembled and subject to low yields in terms of quality currently.
Actually it wouldn't be so simple. Amazon is one of the lowest margin businesses on earth. The vast majority of Bezos' wealth is in Amazon's overpriced stock.
It wouldn't really be possible to pay workers a larger wage both from his wealth, seeing as its stock, nor from cutting margins further.
It's not his workers. It'S Foxconn. Is Bezos also responsible for the livelihood of the people who mine the rare metals in the poorest countries? By this logic this is a never ending chain of responsibilities.
Tariffs on countries with sub-standard working conditions and environmental practices.
I personally don't want to participate in a slave economy.
Wanna bet? Why do you think rural populations leave as soon as they are able and move to cities to work in factories.
> Lots of western elites see something like that as a luxurious retirement.
The bigger stereotype is rich westerners fetishizing harsh rural life - the kind of life they aren't willing to participate in but have no problem advocating for for the poor in developing nations.
I have spoken to many "rich westerners" about my (also western, not poor but rural) upbringing and gotten responses which were longing for that sort of life. It is possible to live very well by a certain standard, on a small amount of land by doing most of the things you need for yourself. There are a lot of people who want that instead of their city life. Not for others but for themselves.
Very few people who didn't experience something like it have any idea at all what it might be like.
I bet. There is a romanticization of a back-to-basics lifestyle. But western farming is nothing like 3rd world subsistence farming.
>It is possible to live very well by a certain standard, on a small amount of land by doing most of the things you need for yourself.
There is a hidden assumption underneath your statement, namely that you have ready access to electricity, indoor plumbing, modern healthcare, and generally typical western infrastructure. So what you're describing is either cottage living, or a hobby farm. Those are nothing like 3rd world subsistence farming.
Development doesn't happen immediately, but it can happen fairly rapidly (50 years for Korea vs 200+ for the US).
By increasing productivity through industrialization and technology advancements, and by doing those things before the rest of the world. (and by having economic systems that accomplished this faster/more effectively than others, possibly also as the result of plagues that decimated the population a few times)
In case nobody gets the joke: the economic system was the plague.
The reduction in population of some of those epidemics made fairly large improvements in the survivors' lives and can be seen as the stimulus in a lot of the progression of Europe.
Progress that led to wealth in the west wan't just the industrial revolution(s), it started long before and was the effect of several technological and social developments.
You seem to be ignoring the human labor part that happened around then and the backbreaking work that they did. Robots didn't get it done nor did the 40 hour work week.
yes, but if you think your great-great grandparents had it easy, well you should ask around and read books written around that time. I think you forget the standards for everyone was just plain misery not long ago.
I have actually read a bit about how one of my great-great grandfathers lived, and it didn't seem he was miserable and could arguably be said to be better off.
More to the point though, the question was how the West got rich. I was talking about the last ~1000 years, maybe a little less, of history in the western world and how their development led in part to the differences in development today. What that has to do with how many ancestors 100 years ago were miserable or not doesn't really connect.
Taking on that subject though, I have this idea that people regardless of situations are on a grand scheme equally miserable. Whether living in a cave 20,000 years ago or a New York penthouse, if you had a way to quantify misery I doubt you would be able to find a significant discrepancy. (corollary: much of the depression and other mental illnesses experienced today are a result of the drastically different environment and set of hardships experienced compared to the ones we evolved in)
The West was still pretty poor even 200 years ago. Going back 1000 years ago makes no difference. Economic development and the fact that almost everyone benefited from it in the West is very, very recent History.
By profiting on other people’s labor time; not their own.
But it also just happens that, in the US, 30 hours is just the right amount to forgo providing benefits and job security, so your proposal was not that far off.
Certainly not. During the early ages of industrialization, workers made a better living in the cities than in the countryside, but had to work a lot for it too.
In the early 1800s the mill employed 885 workers. 540 were female and 497 were children as young as seven. Their working day started at 5:30am, 45-minute breakfast at 9:00am, 45-minute dinner at 2:00pm and work finished at 7:00pm. Children finished at 3:15pm to attend the company school.
The Factory Act, passed in 1833, changed how the mill treated its workers. The act restricted working hours and also prohibited employment of children under nine.
Making bad working conditions and lax environmental standards expenses instead of profit centers.
The US/EU/UK give foreign aid to States with resources they want. Thereby keeping autocrats in power (they take a huge cut of that aid; people typically get the scraps after they pay off essential supporters and generals).
Foreign policy is always about resource management and almost always helps keep autocrats in power. When the nation runs out of resources and aid is cut, it typically promotes democratization because the leader can no longer pay supporters. They have to appeal to the people and increase the influence selectorate size. If they don't and the people rise up, they'll often win if the leader doesn't find a way to pay the police/army.
States (both democratic and autocratic) exist because they have a monopoly on violence. Foreign aid really only helps autocrats maintain that monopoly.
Also, here's a list of recipients of US foreign aid[0]. I don't see an obvious connection between material wealth and amount of aid spent.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid#Over...
States don't exist because they have a monopoly on violence, it is just that a (at least semi-) monopoly on violence is a core trait of a state. Statehood is the evolutionarily stable outcome of any geographic population so far. An area without a state will, without exception, develop one.
Also.. If the job if so bad.. then do something else
Richer people with savings or parental support will always be able to quit & search for better work; and no doubt that’s where this arrogant ‘go and search for another job then’ sentiment comes from.
Note that China doesn’t have effective social security, so retraining isn’t an option.
But I realize these are symbolic. You can't affect a company by purchasing decisions. I still shop at Whole Foods even after the buyout.
The idea you can vote with your dollars is bullshit and ignores the power these companies have with their advertising.
It's not. You're just annoyed noone is 'voting' with you.
2. You're not responsible for fraudulent charges, so worrying about major retailers having your credit card number isn't really reasonable. I don't recommend saving your credit card in any store website. Enter it each time so they can't store it.
Selling things in the USA profitably on the basis of cheap labor in countries with weak environmental and labor protection should not be so simple.
A tariff program is probably not even necessary because overwhelmingly American corporations can simply be taxed for their import activities in a VAT manner and the problem goes away.
It would devastate the poor worldwide. Nations that are rich are the only ones that can spend to care about the environment.
If you want clean air in India and China you want a middle class that demands it because they're not starving.
Jay Kay described the inspiration for Automaton: "in recognition of the rise of artificial intelligence and technology in our world today and how we as humans are beginning to forget the more pleasant, simple and eloquent things in life and in our environment including our relationship with one another as human beings"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automaton_(album)
I was actually thinking of the lyrics of
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Insanity
How so?
If anything, I would be more inclined to buy the latest and greatest tech every year if I had more money to spend. I think most consumers would do the same.
It's maybe early yet to talk about what Bezos is going to do with his fortune; Amazon isn't all-grown-up yet. It's still possible he's going to go in the Gates direction, and I think it's much to early to say he's going in Ellison's direction.
But that doesn't make everything we like him doing an act of philanthropy.
At a bare minimum he could pay the people who have generated his wealth for him a little better.
What is the difference between Bill Gates “philanthropy” and a corporate PR campaign? For example, why is “philanthropy” promoting MasterCard across Africa a great way to address inequality? It appears to have had opposite effects in the US. But even if it were effective: philanthropy?
Math... my brain... what is happening...
Imagine if Nike said that in regards to paying for child labor.
I work for a big mining company, 'social licence' is discussed at board level. Now most of that may very well be corporate bullshit, but the impact of social responsibility perception amongst the owners (shareholders) on share price is clear.
I am not espousing the inhuman treatment of these workers. However, for many people in India and around the world, this would be an order of magnitude improvement of their lives. I think China is on the right track. The working conditions would get better as the economy grows. The injustice might seem appalling, but have you wondered what the alternative is?
Yeah, wealthy people not living like space-age Caligulas on the backs of disenfranchised poor people. Seems like a pretty good alternative to me.
Even when you include the part you conveniently left out about the poor living in even worse conditions that make their current situation a far better option?
Do you really think they were pulled from a cozy office doing 9 to 5 to this?
If we deny these people the prospect of working in factories we are doing them no favours. How is removing demand for their labor going to make them wealthier?
It is not the sweatshops fault these people are poor. It is their poverty that makes a job you find unappealing appealing for them. By all means lobby to increase foreign aid. By all means donate cash via Give Directly.
But don’t think for a moment you are enriching these people’s lives by reducing the demand for their labor. Such thoughts are economic insanity.
Rather it is the sweatshops fault that it is an inhumane sweatshop which treates the people who work there inhumanely.
What? these inhumane working conditions aren't appealing to any human. Nobody is asking to reduce the demand for their labor, maybe the product should be priced accordingly to facilitate good working conditions and pay instead.
This is your privilege talking. Billions of people find them far more appealing than a precarious life of backbreaking farm labor.
From paying labor less than it’s worth and keeping the difference for yourself.
People use sweatshop labor because they can steal even more of the value created by these worker’s labor, knowing there’s not a damn thing they can do about it. And they’ve done so for so long, amassed so much wealth, that they now can pay for boatloads of “intellectuals” to justify their exploitation as good and necessary, leading to us having this conversation now.
In this case it's very clear where wealth comes from: Bezos and the rest of the Amazon shareholders are severely underpaying these workers in violation of China's labor laws. Did you read the article?
> We can’t have stolen this wealth as not the smallest fraction of it existed in all the world before the industrial revolution.
The capacity for self-deception is always a bit surprising. Confronted with a clear and concrete case of labor exploitation and wage theft you insist, never the less, it is not labor exploitation and wage theft. That is economic insanity.
> How is removing demand for their labor going to make them wealthier?
There's no need to appeal to vague self-serving questions. The impact of labor standards on global trade have been studied and their impact can be quantified. Here, in particular, the California Effect [1] has been proven to be very effective in increasing labor and environmental [3] standards around the world. California alone could likely help here a lot by demanding regulatory advertising on these products. The first step would be to educate American consumers so they understand the enormous suffering that goes into these products.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_effect
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/28/opinion/free-trade-by-its...
[3] https://www.nature.org/magazine/archives/the-california-effe...
The vast bulk of 'wealth' is generated by perpetual rent-seeking by those that maintain artificial scarcity. There are exceptions of course, and most of those are to be found in new technologically driven enterprises.
Ummmm evidence? Is there an article or study or book which backs this idea up?
This sounds like one interesting idea (the wealth production enabled by ideas, knowledge, systems, etc) coupled with a big dose of denial of reality, namely, the exploitation (of natural resources in Africa, India, and the americas, and of human labor and lives via slavery) which allowed the industrial revolution to come into being.
Plus, the article mentions how other regions in China such as Shenzhen _do_ have better labor practices. It’s not a binary choice between zero opportunity and abusive sweatshops.
In several generations, they may industrialize to the point where they achieve a western standard of living.
Is it ethical to deny them this chance because it makes you feel bad about thier current condition compared to your own?
Sell child -> Work in sweatshop -> Gain basic labor right of 8-hour -> etc ...
I’m not certain, but I think it does sound like your statement actually is indeed espousing the inhumane of those workers at that factory.
Used to?
I found this article about geese populations dwindling in China: https://www.theverge.com/2017/5/22/15675010/china-wild-geese...
I wonder if that's why they no longer come to Hengyang?
Morality should not be restricted by geographic borders.
Conquest & colonialism want us all to see things with the same glasses.
Saying this is not taking sides or being "cynical" or "capitalistic". The point is if you want change you have to FIGHT to change laws and make them be enforced (through lawsuits / unions). It's always a power struggle and you'll stay on the weak side if you keep screaming "morality" at corporate entities and rely on their good will to enforce workers right... Saying otherwise is deluding other people and/or yourself of reality, but i guess it feels good to feel on "the right side" without actually doing anything.
source: many family members in unions who fought for their rights in france
It's everyone's job.
it's every PERSON's job yeah. not companies.
Not for whatever reason - in fact, US citizens would have a different stance about US workers conditions because they have both the responsibility and the authority (due to their sovereignty) to dictate the working conditions of their fellow countrymen.
Since Chinese people won't grant us the same authority, we shouldn't have the same responsibility and hence our position will be necessarily different.
(Same goes for any other pair of countries; eg Germany and Vietnam or France and Bangladesh)
Perhaps this is due entirely to the race to bottom inspired by competitive pressure -- the various bidders all trying to find a way to offer Amazon the lowest bid -- or perhaps it is due to internal pressures, where managers can be rewarded for finding savings that are significant relative to the cost of a certain phase in the process, even if it is of little consequence for the cost of the final device.
Slap some pretty marketing around your product and most consumers are blissfully ignorant. Certainly helped by global-scale supply chains that add a fog of war.
Even those who are aware of it, in many cases, fall prey to "that's a pity" thinking without actually changing their own habits. Like a crowd of folks walking by litter - many shake their heads, but few actually pick it up.
Have you omitted all such products from your own life? Good for you if so, but few of us can make such a claim.
Tl;dr: Runaway optimization processes erode "sacred" or non-economic values in all environments without a central coordinating authority cognizant of and opposed to the problem. But do read the article; I can't do it justice in a summary.
At the end of the day, these are of the highest paying jobs in the country. "Fair pay" is highly relative and these jobs are slowly and surely helping to build up the Chinese middle class.
Progress is slow, and simply trying to graft the standards of Western societies onto places way behind is tone deaf to reality. Chinese PPP actually higher than USA which considering where the country was only 50 years ago should be seen as a great accomplishment http://www.ibtimes.com/china-economy-surpasses-us-purchasing...
This article is just a hit piece void of any actual economics because it's hip to hate on rich people, in particular one who got there by grinding out efficiency at a desk made from 2x4 for years before the success started.
Hell, when I was 16 working in a kitchen finally making money I did everything I could to get overtime and my goal was hitting 60 hours a week.
These countries will change at their own pace, and Bezos or Apple aren't evil for being of the best jobs in a given country.
Yeah, the hours are very long compared to western standards. I also much prefer the way the Europeans find work-life balance. But that is because you are already a very rich society and you can afford that. Also there is also a cultural and historical difference. In China, or Korea, or Japan, wherever in East Asia, working long hours is very normal, be it for low-level workers or high-level executives. This is just a part of the culture. Without it, how could China which was so poor 40 years ago become rich and powerful again this fast? Even the US is much more workaholic than Europe, without the mandatory one-month holiday etc. If you imagine that Foxconn workers are subjected to slave-like treatments as if they were in a plantation or a mine, you can't be further from facts. Yes, I personally prefer to have a better work-life balance, but that's because I can already make the choices. For many underprivileged populace in China, working for Foxconn is the best possible opportunity they can get.
Of course I also do acknowledge that even though there's no essential slavery the work conditions can and shall be improved, especially now that China has got a lot richer already. In a sense the industrialists during the industrial revolution can also argue that they were not really forcing workers into "slavery", but the workers had actually no choice whatsoever since every workplace was the same (the modern Chinese factories are definitely much better than those places in the 18th century though). Anyways just wanted to offer a different perspective here. If you actually go there and talk to most of the workers I believe you'd hear a similar answer to that offered by my relative, i.e. they just want to save up some money when they can and this opportunity is as good as it can get under the current social circumstances. They'll likely return to their hometown to start something else after working such a job for a while. I do also believe that the accelerating social inequality in China is a problem that has to be addressed and there should be many more opportunities for the poor. But that's in a way similar to what's happening in the US and not something fundamentally/qualitatively different.