Microsoft Responds to Abusive Labor Conditions at Chinese Manufacturer

http://www.fastcompany.com/1617116/microsoft-chinese-suppliers-ncl-kernaghan-kye

by pinstriped_dude • 16 years ago

24 19 16 years ago

fastcompany.com

shin_lao2• 16 years ago

Do you want to pay your mouse 200 € ?

I submit you do not.

That's why companies like Microsoft work with companies like KYE.

cstuder• 16 years ago

Well, we could afford to pay more for our tools. And would be willing to, if it came with a fair trade label associated.

That's a business model which works well for the food industry, both with fair trade and organic production.

ido2• 16 years ago

I think that the problem is that you are a tiny segment of the market.

Average users (both private and corporate customers) don't really care much about their mice.

eregj• 16 years ago

Or, I don't know--we could pay the same provided more of the income went to the low-paid workers and less to the big corporations.

Crazy thinking.

ido2• 16 years ago

In highly competitive markets with a low barrier to entry (such as computer mice and keyboards) profit margins are low and production cost increases are mostly forwarded to the customers.

gaius2• 16 years ago

Well, there's the crux of it. I have a friend, an Irishman, who is livid that Dell is closing their operation in Ireland and moving it to Poland, putting lots of Irish out of work. But when he wanted a PC, he shopped around for the cheapest one, that's how he ended up with Dell in the first place. It's the same with a lot of people I notice. All about the worker's rights but they buy their clothes at Primark, their food at Lidl, their MP3 players are brands you've never heard of from China, everything as cheap as they can.

If you want to see what people believe, look at how they spend their own money.

chaosmachine• 16 years ago

"If you want to see what people believe, look at how they spend their own money."

More along the lines of:

"If you want to see what people are blissfully ignorant of, look at how they spend their money"

smokinn• 16 years ago

I've always been irked by that as well. In Quebec most blue collar workers are unionized. And shop at walmart. While on strike. It's so hypocritical.

hristov• 16 years ago

I am not sure I buy this thinking. If labor was more expensive things might cost more to begin with, but eventually people will figure out how to do stuff with machines. So eventually things will get even cheaper than they were with cheap labor. There is no reason a computer mouse should be assembled by hand at all. But of course nobody wants to invest in automating tasks that can be done for breadcrumbs by some desperate poor people somewhere.

shin_lao2• 16 years ago

Automated assembly is still more expensive than cheap labour. You understimate human beings.

See for yourself: http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=185

Tichy2• 16 years ago

I wonder, are the reporters here genuinely concerned about improving workers lives, or are they mostly enjoying having some leverage over a mighty, powerful company?

dca2• 16 years ago

They are interested in generating controversy, which generates buzz, which generates ad revenue.

zooey• 16 years ago

On this site a large chunk of people think about life and world and people just in an economic way. Maybe maybe, there are others who just live their life following different patterns.

cubicle672• 16 years ago

If you're interested in this sort of thing, may I encourage you to watch a 3 part BBC series "Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts".

It follows 6 young fashionable Brits as they travel to India to spend 3 weeks living and working (almost) as the Indian people who make the clothes they wear. It was made in 2008, but is showing now in Australia on ABC2

Tichy2• 16 years ago

What is a good way to watch it, if you don't live in the UK? The web site only seems to have a trailer?

cubicle672• 16 years ago

Sorry, couldn't find a link, but it's on TV here (Aus) at the moment.

Keyframe• 16 years ago

Companies can automatize build process of chips with nanoscale precision, but somehow mice build+assembly can't be automatized or at least semi-automatized? Same goes for other users of chinese manufacturers like Apple/Foxconn. They consciously knew where they were getting their stuff from because it was cheaper and they knew why it was cheaper.

I don't know the economy behind it - but I can guess that robotization of, at least, most of the process would calculate itself in nicely over time. Come on, it's 2010 - Robots, where art thou?

Microsoft Responds to Abusive Labor Conditions at Chinese Manufacturer

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