AppleInsider StaffApple Computer's iconic digital music players are built primarily by female workers who sometimes earn as little as $50 per week, according to an article in the print edition of Mail on Sunday.
By itself, Foxconn's Longhua facility is reported to house over 200,000 workers — or a population larger than the British city of Newcastle. Its exterior gates flaunt billboards encouraging anyone over the age of 16 to apply for a job.
Inside Longhua, workers labor a 15-hour day building iPods, for which they usually earn about $50 per month. When they're not on the assembly lines, they live in secluded dormitories that each house 100 people and prohibit visitors from the outside world. The workers are allowed "a few possessions" and a "bucket to wash their clothes."
"We have to work too hard and I am always tired. It's like being in the army," Zang Lan, one of the workers at Longhua, told the Mail. "They make us stand still for hours. If we move we are punished by being made to stand still for longer. The boys are made to do pushups."
According to the report, the iPod nano is made in a five-story factory called "E3" that is secured by armed police officers. The super-slim digital music player is said to include over 400 parts which arrive from component manufacturers all over the world.
Another factory in Suzhou, Shanghai, manufacturers iPod shuffles and is completely surrounded by barbed wire. At this facility, 50,000 workers are housed outside the plant and earn about $99 per month. However, they must pay out of pocket for their accommodations and food, "which takes up half their salaries."
One security guard told the Mail that the iPod shuffle production lines are staffed by women workers because "they are more honest than male workers."
According to the report, Apple is just one of thousands of companies that now use Chinese facilities to manufacture its products. China's low wages, long hours and industrial secrecy, make the country attractive to business, especially as increased competition and consumer expectations force companies to deliver products at lower prices.
Marko Zivkovic
Christine McKee
Andrew Orr
Malcolm Owen
Amber Neely
112 Comments
Ahh, the hidden price of low cost goods.
$99 a month is better than $0 a month because you don't have a job. If it weren't for global consumerism feeding the demand for Chinese manufactured good, they wouldn't be experiencing much of any economic growth at all. I get so tired of hearing all the bleeding hearts agonize over the west's (America's) exploitation of workers in China, when any pain they may be experiencing in the short-term will eventually lead to prosperity in the long-term. And the more they deal and interact economically with the rest of the world, the less the communist system will be able to maintian its grip on the lives of the people.
maybe this is why the first shuffles where listed as "do not eat iPod shuffle" because the workers were very hungry and it was rice colored?
maybe this is why the first shuffles where listed as "do not eat iPod shuffle" because the workers were very hungry and it was rice colored?
That's the worst thing I've read all day.
Funny.