Nightline's Look into Apple's Foxconn Factories

[macduke]

Do you live in a dorm? You muppet.

At least this will shut the fools up who thought board and meals are all paid for.

I lived in a dorm for several years not long ago. It wasn't that bad, and I had one of the smaller rooms in the building that I shared with two other people. It was an old hotel from the early 1900s that was remade into dorms. It was kind of janky, but life goes on and I survived. BTW the cheapest room (which we were in) goes for about $3500/semester/person and includes 10 meals/wk. That's $875/mo.

So back to the Chinese factories...

$0.70 per meal, three per day, 30 per month is $63/mo

$17.50 for rent/mo

$1.78/hr * 12hrs * 25 days/mo (6 day weeks) = $534/mo

So $534 - $80.5 = $453.50.

They get to keep 82% of their income after bills. How many Americans can say that? Most can't even pay their bills and have nothing to put in savings each month.

I fail to see how this is much different than people over here taking jobs at oil rigs, or fishing for crabs in the Bering Sea. It's a high demand job that pays better than everything else, but unlike those jobs, the Chinese workers aren't in as much danger. It's hard work, long days—but when you're young you work hard to get ahead. That's no different than in America.

The main problem here is that all the figures are listed in USD. I wish I could eat for $0.70/meal. Or even pay 10 times as much they do for rent. Sure it sucks. But it also sucks that I'm young and have to start out making such little money too while working ridiculously long work weeks. When I graduate in May I can expect 80hr weeks starting out at most agencies and studios. That's what I've been told anyway. Over six days that's 13.3hrs/day. That's more than those Chinese workers. And I'll probably be lucky if I start out making over $35k. Not to mention the tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt.

My point is young people make all kinds of sacrifices to get ahead in life. Doesn't matter if you're American or Chinese. You go where the jobs are and you WORK WORK WORK. The end.

 

[maknik]

You all realize that if you went to work in a canning factory in Kentucky and slept in an 8-person dorm room with shared bathrooms, you too could pay your room costs with only a day's wages, right? You could probably fit 20 people into a 3-bedroom house renting for only a few hundred dollars a month, costing less than $50 a month rent per person.

I wonder why people aren't running down there to live in dorms and take these jobs?

Heck, you could save even more to send back to your family if you ate $2 worth of rice and beans every day, never went out or had a car, and took the company bus to work. I guess Americans are just selfish for not doing this.

 

[Compile 'em all]

Link to the video anywhere? thanks!

 

[ridesdeepsnow]

If you are so worried about China, go live there.

China doesn't operate on US Dollars. If they are getting paid what their government requirements are or above then so be it.

I would think the real story is, why are we allowing so easily these jobs to be located in China

Why doesn't Apple with the 80 billion in reserves build their own plant in the United States and start being a job producer in our country

Oh yes Apple is very much an American company

Apple should build their own products here at home, the risk of the Chinese government ever involving themselves somehow and slowing production of computer products is just too much against our security and economy

 

[marcusj0015]

There are many other companies who have their products assembled by Foxconn.

Will we see another Nightline report about the workers who make the multitude of Android devices?

And that brings me to another question: Are the workers who assemble Apple products treated differently than the workers who assemble products for Vizio and Nintendo?

Apple gets the lionshare of attention, simply because they're the biggest and most respected, it's not fair, but it's the world.

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According to this NYTimes article it would cost around $65 more per iPhone to pay American wages. The wage is seeming a small hurdle comparatively speaking. I recommend reading the whole thing as it's a really good article, IMO.

I'm not an economist or anything, but how would the price of an iPhone, or any product go up in price that substantially? each phone isn't being worked on for 5.5 hours.

And BTW, America will bring back manufacturing jobs as soon as it's economical to have them robot produced, to save the tariffs and taxes from shipping overseas, not to mention shipping costs themselves.

 

[marksman]

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When I see the dorms I think about American kids who pay 100k a year for similar living conditions.

 

[LethalWolfe]

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I didn't read the times article but I don't think the 65 dollar figure could be accurate. It probably does not include the cost to actually build the factories here which would be much more expensive. I suspect they are just doing a per hour multiple. There are not factories here to do this stuff do they would need to be built and allow the company to recoup those costs. There are more costs in a factory than just payroll. Not to mention taxes and benefit costs are much different here.

You should probably read the article. It's pretty interesting. The $65 estimate is just additional cost for increasing wages to what American workers would make. As the article states, it doesn't take into consideration other things like available workforce, proximity between plants making the raw materials and plants receiving the raw materials, etc.,. and those things are much more costly than paying American wages.

From later in the same NYTimes article:

“Our customers are in Taiwan, Korea, Japan and China,” said James B. Flaws, Corning’s vice chairman and chief financial officer. “We could make the glass here, and then ship it by boat, but that takes 35 days. Or, we could ship it by air, but that’s 10 times as expensive. So we build our glass factories next door to assembly factories, and those are overseas.”

Corning was founded in America 161 years ago and its headquarters are still in upstate New York. Theoretically, the company could manufacture all its glass domestically. But it would “require a total overhaul in how the industry is structured,” Mr. Flaws said. “The consumer electronics business has become an Asian business. As an American, I worry about that, but there’s nothing I can do to stop it. Asia has become what the U.S. was for the last 40 years.”

I'm not an economist or anything, but how would the price of an iPhone, or any product go up in price that substantially? each phone isn't being worked on for 5.5 hours.

I'm not one either, but maybe if you read the article it would explain things better?

Lethal

 

[marcusj0015]

Apple and the rest of the world...

Just because the jobs are in demand, does not give you the right to be a pig and pay dog food wages while you roll in ungodly profits.

Sony does not have a machine that runs OSX, but at least the Z is made in Japan where people are paid accordingly for the work done.

Perhaps we should start thinking different on what we buy Apple.

It's supply & demand

 

[marksman]

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Makes me sad knowing the the per hour rate and struggle young generation is facing in china. I earn 68$ per hour giving 8 hours everyday. I wish apple provides a increment to these young people and make things better for their lives.

Actually in the last several years as apple has prospered starting salaries at Foxconn have more than doubled.

 

[meatballs]

Oh my gosh, Foxconn workers pay for their own meals and rent???

HEY, JUST LIKE ME!

And if you manufacture something in Tennessee rather than in San Francisco because it's cheaper, is that somehow unfair and exploitative?

Oh so you live at the factory where you work 12 hours a day. How is it? Don't you miss HAVING A LIFE?

 

[root42]

If the $1.78 figure is the net income, then this will put a Foxconn worker approximately on the same level as a car mechanic, according to this site: http://www.worldsalaries.org/china.shtml -- if this is the gross income, then it would be below that, obviously. Also, the site I cited uses 2005 US Dollars, to make things comparable. Hence the value they show on the site is probably a bit too high.

 

[marcusj0015]

I have a question about this assembly line, is Foxconn doing EVERYTHING? like, are they putting the chips on the logic board, or simply assembling complete packages? IE the lcd and battery and logic board, i it's the second, I don't see how that could take more than half an hour or so each phone.

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Oh so you live at the factory where you work 12 hours a day. How is it? Don't you miss HAVING A LIFE?

THEY choose where they work and how they work. if they didn't want those jobs, they don't have to take them. it's very simple.

 

[marksman]

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You all realize that if you went to work in a canning factory in Kentucky and slept in an 8-person dorm room with shared bathrooms, you too could pay your room costs with only a day's wages, right? You could probably fit 20 people into a 3-bedroom house renting for only a few hundred dollars a month, costing less than $50 a month rent per person.

I wonder why people aren't running down there to live in dorms and take these jobs?

Heck, you could save even more to send back to your family if you ate $2 worth of rice and beans every day, never went out or had a car, and took the company bus to work. I guess Americans are just selfish for not doing this.

Probably because those jobs don't pay as much, relatively speaking as Foxconn jobs. Also our 17-25 year olds are clearly softer and lazier than their Chinese counterparts. Most of ours live off their parents instead of supporting their parents.

 

[BobbyRond]

http://abcnews.go.com/International...apples-chinese/story?id=15748745#.T0S46Jgb1vA
http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/apples-chinese-factories-exclusive-15763346
http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/apples-controversial-supplier-foxconn-15763376
http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/foxconn-employees-factory-work-15763403
http://abcnews.go.com/International/slideshow/inside-apples-factories-china-15750239

I guess this is it...

 

[marcusj0015]

This wouldn't be an issue if:

1. U.S. based companies hadn't shipped all the jobs overseas mainly because of #2 below
2. If unions hadn't drove up the pay rate until it was ridiculous
3. If the world's population wasn't spiraling out of control

FACTORY LINE WORKERS SHOULDN'T MAKE MORE THAN TEACHERS. Just because you screw a bolt onto a Chevy Malibu doesn't mean you should get paid $60k a year. My wife is an Autism Specialist—she trains parents on how to reinforce proper behaviors with their autistic children. She gets bitten, scratched, and bruised by these little rascals. Not to mention our car gets peed all over when she transports them. She makes $12.50/hr. I'm a student and I'm working as a web design intern. I make $9/hr making $10-20k websites from wire-frame, to Photoshop mockup, to HTML/CSS coding, to using WP as a CMS with custom-coded/modified plugins. Why should some factory worker doing repetitive, often mindless work make so much more than the two of us combined?

ALSO—PEOPLE NEED TO STOP HAVING SO MANY BABIES. Just stop it. Believe it or not, we are going to run out of food, water, and room one of these days. And if you didn't notice, the birth rate is increasing exponentially. That is a very, very bad thing. Expect more of this from more areas of the world as people are so ubiquitous that they are no longer considered human and are thought of as disposable machines.

In addition I'm pissed off that college costs so much and tuition increases twice the rate of inflation—but I'll save that rant for another day as I'm rapidly drifting off topic.

Yes, I don't get why people have more than two kids. have a boy and girl, what else is there to experience raising? are you hoping a dragon'll pop out?

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or an example of unions killing jobs, look no further than public education.

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Probably because those jobs don't pay as much, relatively speaking as Foxconn jobs. Also our 17-25 year olds are clearly softer and lazier than their Chinese counterparts. Most of ours live off their parents instead of supporting their parents.

Somebody hates his kids, on a related note, most 17-25 year olds are furthering their education.

 

[maverickoc]

Hmmm.. A few thoughts from a newbie to this forum who lives in China...

I currently work here training Chinese teachers and teaching classes myself, and I make about 10,000RMB/month. My Chinese colleagues earn based on how many classes they teach, and most earn around 3500-4000 RMB a month (not my decision) for teaching around five classes per day (about 9-10 hours a day). So, considering that the teachers that we get all have bachelors degrees and live pretty good lives, I'd say that the salary that the Foxconn staff get isn't too bad. (Ends up being about 3500 RMB)

Food is also extremely cheap here- I never cook, eat out every day and never spend more than 50RMB/day if it's just me. Breakfast consists of steamed buns stuffed with pork and vegetables (Bao Zi, one of the most delicious dishes I've ever had) and I eat four of them plus a couple of bottles of soya milk. It costs about 8 RMB. If I were to buy a meal of similar size back home in New Zealand, I'd be paying $10-12 plus. (Keep in mind that with the exchange rates, NZD$1 = about 5 RMB and USD$1 = about 6.2 yuan)

If I eat out at a restaurant with a few friends and order five or six dishes for us to share plus a few rounds of beers, it'll end up costing around 90-120RMB, depending on how nice the restaurant is. I hired a private room in a restaurant one night and ate with 4 other teachers complete with Karaoke (KTV here) and beers the bill ended up being around 300RMB.

My power bill every month is about 200RMB. I pay 500RMB for my iPhone and iPad sims because I use the damn thing so much, and that gives me 6000 calling minutes, free short number calls (free local calling), 10,000 SMS messages and 3GB of 3G data (data each for iPad and iPhone) (I think). I get internet free with the apartment, unlimited use and a 24MBit/sec line. So all in all, 6000RMB + is considered to be a good salary here- Which means these workers are earning an average wage that is more than good enough to live on.

Another thing, didn't SJ mention in his biography that he had talked to Obama about moving more manufacturing here, but couldn't due to the lack of trained engineers?

Cheers

 

[meatballs]

THEY choose where they work and how they work. if they didn't want those jobs, they don't have to take them. it's very simple.

Yeah the life of a homeless person is always an option I guess.

 

[marcusj0015]

Yeah the life of a homeless person is always an option I guess.

LOL, because Foxconn is the only employment option in all of China.

 

[coolfactor]

My point is young people make all kinds of sacrifices to get ahead in life. Doesn't matter if you're American or Chinese. You go where the jobs are and you WORK WORK WORK. The end.

Just imagine if us Western nations grew some balls and kicked all of the slackers off of the social assistance system... it's disgusting how many people get a cheque handed to them every month for doing nothing, while many of the rest of us work countless hours for the same or less money.

 

[tdream]

I lived in a dorm for several years not long ago. It wasn't that bad, and I had one of the smaller rooms in the building that I shared with two other people. It was an old hotel from the early 1900s that was remade into dorms. It was kind of janky, but life goes on and I survived. BTW the cheapest room (which we were in) goes for about $3500/semester/person and includes 10 meals/wk. That's $875/mo.

So back to the Chinese factories...

$0.70 per meal, three per day, 30 per month is $63/mo

$17.50 for rent/mo

$1.78/hr * 12hrs * 25 days/mo (6 day weeks) = $534/mo

So $534 - $80.5 = $453.50.

They get to keep 82% of their income after bills. How many Americans can say that? Most can't even pay their bills and have nothing to put in savings each month.

I fail to see how this is much different than people over here taking jobs at oil rigs, or fishing for crabs in the Bering Sea. It's a high demand job that pays better than everything else, but unlike those jobs, the Chinese workers aren't in as much danger. It's hard work, long days—but when you're young you work hard to get ahead. That's no different than in America.

The main problem here is that all the figures are listed in USD. I wish I could eat for $0.70/meal. Or even pay 10 times as much they do for rent. Sure it sucks. But it also sucks that I'm young and have to start out making such little money too while working ridiculously long work weeks. When I graduate in May I can expect 80hr weeks starting out at most agencies and studios. That's what I've been told anyway. Over six days that's 13.3hrs/day. That's more than those Chinese workers. And I'll probably be lucky if I start out making over $35k. Not to mention the tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt.

My point is young people make all kinds of sacrifices to get ahead in life. Doesn't matter if you're American or Chinese. You go where the jobs are and you WORK WORK WORK. The end.

Agencies and studios, doing what kind of work? Hmm? Don't pretend like you work harder than the foxconn workers do. And don't pretend like they get paid more than you do when you sleep in a nice apartment get your coffee from starbucks are groceries from Whole foods.

It's just laughable that Americans are justifying the low wages workers are paid and then comparing it to the poorest people in society. "They should be lucky to have jobs at all", "dey turk er jerrrbbbbsss".

Browsing through the forums it's easy to see why they take the same view as you do, the most troubling issues they have are first world problems like should I get the 15 inch macbook pro with anti-glare matt screen or not.

 

[CplBadboy]

5 Days to make an iPad eh?? Really??? Does the making of the aluminium (thats al-u-minimum) attribute to this time. Seems an awfully long time if you asks me. These things are churned off surely one every 5 minutes.

i don't understand why people say that oh if they where made in the US at 12 bucks an hour we would be paying a fortune for it. Look at it a different way. If that was the case the products would still be as popular but Apple wouldn't have the incredibly high profit margins it does and at the same time would help its own US economy. They could still sell at the same price and make the profit.

Listen iPhones are made for 8 dollars and sold for 600 or there a bouts. The only reason for making things in China is the cheap labour. Whatever way you look at it its kinda wrong that Apple is failing to give its workers a decent standard of living - not 20 man dorms but 4 man spacious living - and facilities that they could so easily afford. Ultimately Apple should be responsible and from what Im reading they are more or less turning blind eye. They seem to preach all this do good but dont seem to actually embrace it. How about they draw a comparison what its like to work on Apple HQ in California with all its facilities to those at FoxConn Its all a bit distasteful if you ask me.

 

[lostngone]

According to this NYTimes article it would cost around $65 more per iPhone to pay American wages. The wage is seeming a small hurdle comparatively speaking. I recommend reading the whole thing as it's a really good article, IMO.Lethal

That $65 number is so flawed. I see everyone throwing that misleading number around and it makes me mad. I would love to see production here in the U.S. but the initial cost to do this would make it very cost prohibitive.

Maybe after the fabrication facilities and assembly lines were built and you could find U.S. sourced component manufactures(batteries, chips, resistors, capacitors, etc) and you trained a large work force. Maybe after 3 to 5 years you might see that number come down to around $65 more then it costs now but until then do these people think Apple should just not turn a profit because no wants to pay that much for an Apple device?

The people at Apple didn't just wake up one day and decide to move production to China. The did it to stay competitive and because it is MUCH cheaper to make hardware over there.

 

[marcusj0015]

Is there any place to talk to an economist online? I have a few questions about what'll happen when robots take over manufacturing worldwide. all theoretical, but still.

 

[Goratrix]

Unions started to decline from usefulness to absolute albatross 50 years ago. There are plenty of non union businesses in the us none with deplorable work conditions.

They need for unions in the us is long gone and they only exist now to squeeze money and prevent companies from being competitive. In still existing strong unions it is impossible to fire a completely incompetent employee. Unions destroyed our automotive industry, the airline industry and education.

It will be a good day when unions stop existing in the us.

You should take a look at Germany. Their economy is doing amazingly well, despite the crisis, yet they have maybe the strongest unions in the world.

 

[BobbyRond]

5 Days to make an iPad eh?? Really??? Does the making of the aluminium (thats al-u-minimum) attribute to this time. Seems an awfully long time if you asks me. These things are churned off surely one every 5 minutes.

It takes 5 days to complete production, but in those 5 days many iPad are made. The 5 days stand for the first to the last step.

i don't understand why people say that oh if they where made in the US at 12 bucks an hour we would be paying a fortune for it. Look at it a different way. If that was the case the products would still be as popular but Apple wouldn't have the incredibly high profit margins it does and at the same time would help its own US economy. They could still sell at the same price and make the profit.

The iPhone would indeed be more expensive to make, but Apple will probably have enough profit left to be profitable as a company. I agree with you on that.

Fact is: you can't bring manufacturing back to the US. People are not willing to work 6 days for 12 hours. For $12 an hour people would start working there and within a couple of month people want more time off, better working conditions, etc. So Western people are simply too spoilt to do this kind of work.

Also you would need to find 235,000 people willing to do this work. Seems like a bit much.

Add to this the fact that you need to build a load of factories and dorms. Doesn't seem very plausible or profitable.

Listen iPhones are made for 8 dollars and sold for 600 or there a bouts. The only reason for making things in China is the cheap labour. Whatever way you look at it its kinda wrong that Apple is failing to give its workers a decent standard of living - not 20 man dorms but 4 man spacious living - and facilities that they could so easily afford. Ultimately Apple should be responsible and from what Im reading they are more or less turning blind eye. They seem to preach all this do good but dont seem to actually embrace it. How about they draw a comparison what its like to work on Apple HQ in California with all its facilities to those at FoxConn Its all a bit distasteful if you ask me.

http://www.isuppli.com/Teardowns/Ne...8,-IHS-iSuppli-Teardown-Analysis-Reveals.aspx

1st: Manufacturing costs are $8, not the complete phone.
2nd: There are no 20 man dorms, but 8 man dorms
3rd: Let's say we would go from 8 man dorms to 4 man spacious living, we would massively increase the size of the living quarters. 200 sq ft for 4 people to live in (spacious enough?) would mean 1,000,000 workers taking up 2 square miles. This would be if all the rooms were adjacent. So make it 4 square miles. Good luck with that.
4th: For the last time. Apple ≠ Foxconn. Apple is not failing at giving decent living standards. Apple is not responsible. And yet they are making a huge effort. Get your facts straight. Read this and then come back to me with a solid argument:

http://www.apple.com/supplierresponsibility/
http://abcnews.go.com/International...apples-chinese/story?id=15748745#.T0TEvpgb1vA