Week 14. Global Issues

7/29/2019 Week 14. Global Issues

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Week 14

The Global Issues

Sweatshops


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Whos wearing NIKES?

Please check your shoes to see if theywere manufactured in Vietnam, China,

or Indonesia

If they were, they were produced in a

sweatshop!


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Sweatshops

Definition: A shop employing workers at low wages, for long

hours, and under poor conditions.

Factory where workers do piecework for poor payand are prevented from forming unions; common in

the clothing industry


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Origins

Began between 1830 and 1850

Caused by industrial revolution

Began in the Garment Industry

London, New York City

Sweating (1840s)

Long Hours

Low Wages

Unsafe Conditions

Began in the U.S. from Civil War need for Uniforms

Between 1850 and 1900, sweatshops attracted the rural poorto rapidly-growing cities


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Benefits of Sweatshops

Comparative Advantage

If sweatshop jobs did not improve their workers' standardof living, those workers would not have taken the jobs

Free Market Advocates

1997 UNICEF study 5,000 to 7,000 Nepalese children turned to prostitution

after the US banned that country's carpet exports in the

1990s
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_livinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_livinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNICEFhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNICEFhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_livinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living


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Dilemma.

While supporters of economicglobalization talk of increased

prosperity and development, thereality is economic globalization hasled to a global race to the bottom,

creating a sweatshop epidemic


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Harm/maltreatment of

Sweatshops Neoliberal Globalization

stiffing the working classes and ingeneral feeding as much money asis humanly possible up to the 1%

Race to the bottom

corporations set up shop all around the

world in search of the cheapest laborand fewest regulations, increasing theglobal sweatshop epidemic.

Workers Rights / Conditions


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Sweatshops and Wal-Mart


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Wal-Mart products

Produced in 48 different countries

Products mainly from Asian and CentralAmerican factories

Produced using sweatshop labor


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Wal-Mart as an importer

10% of all Chinese imports are imported by Wal-

Mart Own global procurement division

The Wal-Mart Squeeze

Endless mission to squeeze countries for lowerwages and cheaper goods

Lowering working standards where ever they go


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Textiles and Wal-Mart

Produced by young women 17 to 25

years old Forced to work seven days a week

12 to 28 cents an hour

No benefits Housed in crowded and dirty dormitories

24-hour-a-day surveillance


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Toys of Misery and Wal-Mart

Seventy-one percent of the toys sold in the U.S.come from China

13- to 16-hour days molding, assembling, andspray-painting toys

20-hour shifts in peak season (Christmas)

Seven days a week

Paid as low as 13 cents an hour Live in Shacks or Dorms

No medical care or safety equipment

Poor Conditions


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Not just China

Bangladesh

El Salvador


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Some of the common abuses in the

sweatshops

Forced overtime

Locked bathrooms

Starvation wages

Pregnancy tests

Denial of access to health care Workers fired and blacklisted

Occasional beatings

Pending wages


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Sweatshops and Wal-

Mart Not just over seas

US labor law violations

Violating child labor laws Employees forced to work off the clock

Locking employees into stores overnight

Undocumented workers


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Sweatshops and Nike


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Sweatshops and Nike

Indonesia, China, and Vietnam produce Nikeproducts

Why these 3 countries? Labor laws are poorly enforced

Cheap labor is plentiful

Local laws prohibit workers from forming independenttrade unions

Nikes Excuse Dont own factories

They only market shoes


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Sweatshops and Nike

Vietnam and Nike There are about 35,000 workers Vietnamese

More than 90 percent of them are young women

12-hour days making Nike shoes Produce shoes in an unhealthy environment full of toxic

chemicals

Receivers of beatings and withheld wages

Employees are making 20 cents an hour

Earn $2.40 a day - only slightly more than the $2 or so itcosts to buy three healthy meals a day

Not allowed to use the bathroom more than once in an 8-hour shift

Allowed to drink water only twice per shift


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Sweatshops and Nike

Fun Facts In many cases, employees are actually spending

more just to live and work at the factories than

they actually make. Michael Jordan was given a shoe contract for

$20 million dollars in the mid 1990s. At thesame time Nike and the factories paid the entire

35000 contracted Vietnamese employees only30.5 million dollars for their work for the entireyear.

Total labor costs for the shoes amount to lessthan $2 a pair; the shoes retail for up to $180 in

the United States.


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Companies Supporting SweatshopFactories

GAP

OLD NAVY

Banana Republic

Reebok

Adidas

Bridgestone

Firestone

Uniroyal

Starbucks

Sears

Mattel

Dell

Hewlett Packard

Motorola

G.E.

Walt Disney

Target

Home Depot

J.C. Penny

+ others


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Questions

How does sweatshop affect theorganizations?

Are Global Sweatshops exploitative?


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Week 14. Global Issues

Documents

Transcript of Week 14. Global Issues