The "Workers' Paradise" eats its own

[shanek]

The question is where that line gets drawn. I see lots of reference to "choice," but I have problems applying that concept to a Chinese farmer moving from being victimized by agricutural policy to working in a factory in a less than free society by any measure.

So, you don't see the addition of a choice where none was before as progress? You demand a line, but it's really a blurred gradient.

It seems it is taken as assumed that there will be some sort of evolution towards a better life for the Chinese, and that end justifies any present conditions.

No, it's been OBSERVED in every single developed country that this is just one of the steps you have to go through to get from abject misery and poverty to prosperity. You can't just snap your fingers and go from one to the other.

 

[c0rbin]

I'm hardly up on Irish history.

It all gets a bit fuzzy after the second glass.

 

[shanek]

Chinese labor unions.

See, here's the kind of thing I'm talking about:

1. Overtime working exceeds 36 hours every month.

Ah. So they have to work overtime 1-2 hours a day. How horrible!

2. The factory still hasn’t bought medical insurance and pension for all its workers. For those who have insurance, the workers have to pay for part of it (some workers say it’s 31 RMB), which is not in accordance with Chinese law again.

Well, this is actually a good thing. Whenever businesses are forced to provide medical insurance for their workers, they end up spending more per worker than a worker would buying it himself, due to the removal of any incentive to economize and the necessity of covering everything any of the workers could need. Also, that money is going to come out of what workers would otherwise be paid. Workers are actually worse off with medical benefits, not better.

3. The hourly wage of a worker is only 33 cents. (US $)

And what is the buying power of that 33¢? It's just taken for granted that that's a horrible thing.

4. There is no very good labor protection, which means the workers are still exposed to a poisonous environment.

I have no idea what this means. However, it does appear that China has little or no way for an injured worker to seek damages; this is a crucial part of the picture and one that China needs to fix.

5. According to the 9 interviewees, 7 of them were completely unaware of the function of the labor union. When inquired if they would utilize the labor union to struggle for their rights, they all said they had no idea, and 6 of them said it depended on the factory boss to improve the labor conditions.

So, they don't really think the labor union is going to do anything for them at all. Smart people.

 

[shanek]

But that was 1982, Luke T.! Things have changed!

Hmmm...more people were injured in a single state with a population of 12 million had over TWICE as many injuries than China with a population of 1.3 billion??? Man...that's 7 injuries per 100,000 vs. .03 per 100,000! Even if Penn. is counting more minor injuries than China is, that's still a lot. At about 43 times the amount, I don't think you can just explain it away by a difference in statistics.

 

[Luke T.]

Hmmm...more people were injured in a single state with a population of 12 million had over TWICE as many injuries than China with a population of 1.3 billion??? Man...that's 7 injuries per 100,000 vs. .03 per 100,000! Even if Penn. is counting more minor injuries than China is, that's still a lot. At about 43 times e amount, I don't think you can just explain it away by a difference in statistics.

Well, as more steel mills close in Pennsylvania, worker injuries should drop more and more.

 

[varwoche]

Don't be too quick to judge 'faggots'

American is clearly a latent homosexual. See how the homophobia (self hatred) is injected into topics that are totally unrelated? Classic case.

 

[specious_reasons]

Suddenly said he was going to post more about China now and the West then, and I thought I would point out the labor unions in China now are about at the stage our labor unions were then. We had the government and business actively opposing reform at the time, too.

When in the history of the US were the Unions puppets of the US government?

 

[specious_reasons]

So, they don't really think the labor union is going to do anything for them at all. Smart people.

Odd. I thought the labor unions were the free market solution to unfair labor practices.

 

[Shane Costello]

Originally posted by Suddenly:
Somehow we got fixed on the proposition that disapproving of the present working conditions is somehow the same as disaproving of industrialization in and of itself. I really don't see that.

FWIW I didn't think that was the poiint you were trying to make.

We can take it as a given that cheap Chinese labor benefits us and the world in general. All that is left is the nagging moral questions about the specifics of how cheap we are going to allow that labor to be. Would we object to outright slavery? I'd guess so, regardless of the potential effects. The question is where that line gets drawn. I see lots of reference to "choice," but I have problems applying that concept to a Chinese farmer moving from being victimized by agricutural policy to working in a factory in a less than free society by any measure.

What might look like cheap labour in our eyes probably looks like very lucrative employment in the eyes of a Chinese peasant. I think it's important not to focus on wage rates, but how these translate into purchasing power. Relatively speaking $100 a month in China might be equivalent to twenty times that amount in the US or Europe.

It seems it is taken as assumed that there will be some sort of evolution towards a better life for the Chinese, and that end justifies any present conditions.

I'm curious as to whether people think that industrialization is in and of itself a guarantee for progress of a society. If the people move from being maimed and starved by collective agriculture to being starved maimed and starved as unskilled labor in a factory there really isn't a huge difference.

Well, I wouldn't take it as given that industrialisation will inevitably lead to greater political freedom and accountability in China, but there are historical parallels. Don't forget that millions died as a result of collectivisation, and I don't think work accidents are wreaking that kind of horror. I'd also doubt that if China remains primarily agricultural that reform will have any kind of future.

Originally posted by ShaneK:
Could you provide more information about what you're talking about? I'm hardly up on Irish history.

The Great Famine. Toiling in a dickensian sweatshop can't have been pleasant, but if the alternative was starving to death because a subsistence crop failed then it wasn't that bad.

 

[Luke T.]

When in the history of the US were the Unions puppets of the US government?

You have interpreted my post exactly oppposite of its meaning.