The argument here is that no one forces them to work there. They choose to work there because their other option, joblessness out in the country, is even worse. In a minimal fashion they are better off because of the factory. So you could argue the company is actually helping them and not immoral at all.

No... you're doing that.

Yep, and they should be damned grateful, too!

The nerve of those [insert expletive] excuses for human beings! [heavy sarcasm used]

It's all relative to what the market would bear in contract terms.  I don't think higher contract costs would sell more pieces of hardware.

Merely playing devil's advocate. Discussions are boring if everyone just group thinks.

If you see a homeless man begging for money and you only give him five cents are you being immoral? Sure you're not really helping him much but you're certainly not harming him either.

I vote we unionize the Chinese so that they can experiences what it is truly like to work in a free nation. . .

Hahahaha, I thinks you are being sarcastic??

US corps have become very efficient at union busting right here. Imagine how efficient they would be with the red army backing them.

China tyrannizes its own people, arresting people for political reasons (such as being Buddhist) and forcing them into laogai -- "reform through labor."  This means forced, unpaid labor -- slavery.

While laogai camps are unlikely to produce electronics directly (as they are unskilled labor camps), the materials that go into electronics and other manufactured goods are processed in these forced labor camps.

Slavery, brutally subjugating peaceful demonstrations (does no one remember Tienamen Square!?), environmental irresponsibility, hidden toxic materials ... there is absolutely no reason nor excuse whatosever to produce anything in China and bring it to the U.S except capitalism trumping basic human rights.  The Chinese powers that be and domestic industrialists are making a killing by not paying fair labor wages (and, in fact, not paying for labor at all in some components and materials), not paying for environmental responsibility and circumventing every single U.S. labor, human rights and environmental law by transferring production to China.  The Chinese people and the American workers lose out big time to this abusive exploit and violation of U.S. laws, including the emancipation proclamation.

It is not true... China recycle his toxic material in the baby plastic toy that they sell in the rest of the world...  

Apple employs maybe 40,000 people in the U.S. ( I think that's what I heard on the radio )

Foxconn employs 1 million Chinese. I don't know how many work on Apple products. It's got to be hundreds of thousands.

Here's where I'm at on this: I don't give a rat's ass what kind of conditions those workers have to endure. I used to care but I got to thinking about the fact that those jobs should be in the U.S. and that changed my thinking.

American companies should be making American products in America. If they aren't we shouldn't buy them. If they aren't then they shouldn't get any tax breaks or be able to take advantage of any tax loopholes. I don't care what company it is or what they make. It's very simple.

Perhaps this Neowin.net  http://www.neowin.net/news/fair-labor-association-foxconns-apple-plant-is-first-class article might help convince you that conditions are improving and exceed those in other plants in China. The fact that Apple has joined FLA is to me reassuring and shows they are not deaf to others. That it should have been done long ago, when Apple started using Foxconn would have been best. Perhaps  they felt their mechanisms were adequate when they were not.

At any rate, I feel better about their step, and think others do as well.

FLA funding comes from companies it monitors so it's not truly independent, it would not take much for a work place in China to have a better comparison than others. This is just a reaction to public opinion ...

Good idea ... but companies, like Apple, would just move over seas for a better tax outcome. This is one of the justifications of having tax breaks in the first place.

You might feel better about it but that's easy for you. Try being one of those workers for a day, a week or whatever.

Hell I've worked 7 days a week sometimes, mostly in the 80's and 90's. I got overtime and made as Ray Davies said "Real money" but that's all pissed away now on good times. The point is that working hard at sweaty jobs doesn't get you shit anymore.

The gravy train rolled on by in AMERIKA and now who's left to pick up the pieces?

They've busted the unions and shipped the manufacturing overseas. It's all for the sake of quick profits.

If you want to believe that Apple is actually going to change their business model because of the information that's come out on the workers plight in China then I guess I should sell you the Brooklyn Bridge.

The only thing that will convince me that Apple and a whole bunch of multinational so called American companies are going to change is when they bring those lost jobs back to the U.S.A.

I'm not holding my breath.

Yeah. I never did crap jobs in 12-18 hr shifts to keep my wife and kid alive while I was in Med School. Wars had comfy hours too. I never did 36 hrs every 72 hrs during Internship and Residency.

No one has ever worked as hard as them or you.

Any band-aid measures that Apple will be putting in place will be to make negative press just 'go away' and find another bleeding heart target.

Let's face it....'suicide nets' was pretty bloody 'negative press'.

Once the spotlight is gone....profits will win out.

Fear not....capitalism is safe....

Whew, what I said totally went over your head and for you to compare med school with working at a Apple plant in China or what i did which was newspaper work......I don't get it. It ain't about that.

What I was saying is that at the newspaper in the 70's, 80's and 90's there was so much work, so much overtime that it was like a gold mine. I wish it were still like that! I made gobs of money back then unlike slave laborers in China now. I am saying that for the most part the days of people in America who make something, a product or manufacture an item, no longer have an environment where they can make good money. They shipped all that off to China or India and for one reason or another, like in newspapers the need for skilled labor has gone bye bye. The middle class cannot make a come back unless there are manufacturing jobs for them. When you ship millions upon millions of jobs overseas what are you replacing those jobs with? There are only so many Taco Bell or McDonalds jobs out there and even then that kind of money ain't shit.

When WWII started America was able to build planes and tanks at Ford, Chrysler and GM plants. We were able to make parachutes and uniforms because the factories were there already, factories that previously made clothes. We had a manufacturing base. We don't have a that now. Even now at automobile assembly plants in the U.S. a lot of the parts for the cars come from over seas. For the sake of unlimited profit the American middle class has been sold down the river by multinational pirates like Apple.

Capitalism is not manufacturing. It's an end all in the process of making profit for the sake of profit and the welfare of the worker isn't taken into account. The middle class, the 99%, loses out in that equation but the 1% profits handsomely.