Your iPad (Still) Comes From The Hands Of Teenagers Living A Factory Life
by Julie Bort on Feb 22, 2012, 2:09 AM
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 It was true in January and a month later it's still true: your iPad was built in part by teenagers working 12-hour days for under $2 an hour. So was your iPhone, and in all likelihood, your Xbox, your Windows phone and other devices from likes of Dell, Motorola, and Hewlett-Packard. On Tuesday, ABC's Nightline broadcast its tour of Foxconn, the Chinese contract manufacturer that reportedly builds 40 percent of the world's electronics. It accompanied Fair Labor Association inspectors on their first look at the Foxconn facility. While Nightline's anchor Bill Weir billed the report as "unprecedented access" to Foxconn, this was, however, a planned inspection. The Nightline special was brought on by a previous visit to Foxconn which aired last month. PRI's "This American Life" did a special on Apple's manufacturing, in which it pointed out that the people making our electronics are working under conditions that would be illegal in the U.S. A 13-year old interviewed by "This American Life" said Foxconn doesn't really check ages. She pointed out that there are on-site inspections, from time to time, but because Foxconn knows they are coming, before the inspectors arrive, Foxconn just replaces the young-looking workers with older ones. So, it's not surprising, perhaps, that Nightline painted a fairly rosy picture of Foxconn's Apple factory. Weir did express surprise at how young the workers were "17, 18, no one looked over 30," he said, but he didn't find any that admitted to being 13. They make a promised starting wage of $1.78/hour. Apple raised pay this month by 16% to 25%. They work 12-hour shifts with two meal breaks for which they pay 70 cents a meal and they pay $17.50/month for a room in a dorm with 7 strangers. The facilities are not inhuman. There's a swimming pool and classroom where workers can take classes -- such as learning English. But the dorm's biggest feature is their suicide nets. Weir also visited the villages that many of these young workers come from lest you forget life can be harsh in China. It showed that some villagers live in crowded, dirt-floor rooms with no heat. Compared to that, by American standards, the dorms are an upgrade. But excessive, oppressive work for meager pay isn't a way for a teenager to live, even if it offers more creature comfort than impoverishment. American's love electronics. We love the low prices we pay and we love high margins and profits from American companies that sell them to us. So where does that leave the laborers that make them? In China, with no labor unions, it leaves them using suicide as a form of labor negotiation. At least, that's how Foxconn CEO Terry Gou characterized an incident in January when 200 employees working on Microsoft Xbox consoles threatened suicide .. a labor negotiation tactic. As for the Nightline look-see, remember that Apple paid $250,000 to join the FLA and also paid the tab for the inspection. The FLA inspectors said that even though they would expect Foxconn to put on a show for them, their investigation will uncover true working conditions because they interview workers. "When we publish the report any whitewashing will be obvious," the inspector promised. He said he's looking for clues about working conditions such as "Will workers look up?" Foreign visitors are "objects of curiosity .. can they steal a glance?" In other facilities they won't look indicating they are "really intimated." For those looking to feel better about the lives of the people making their electronics, the Nightline report delivers. Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.
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