5 ms·

Globalization is the new slavery. Once upon a time you force-brought cheap labor to work on your plantation and paid them with food basically. Today the slaves

by kesor 5y ago

Globalization is the new slavery. Once upon a time you force-brought cheap labor to work on your plantation and paid them with food basically. Today the slaves do their work in China and you pay them with printed dollars backed by nothing.

nottorp 5y ago
Yeah those poor slaves queueing at Foxconn's gates to get a job assembling iphones for the evil american consumer. Because it pays a lot more than tending the rice fields like their parents. Just for the record, I'm eastern european and slaving for the evil american tech firms ;)
- andrepd 5y ago
  >Yeah those poor slaves queueing at Foxconn's gates to get a job assembling iphones for the evil american consumer. Because it pays a lot more than tending the rice fields like their parents. Unironically yes? Do you claim those people are making choices of their own free will? When they have no other option? They can't even change their government for christs sake, how can it be claimed they are engaging in a "free" market? You are very privileged that you can work from your bedroom and get a nice salary while living in a low cost of living area. Don't forget that, when you talk about how sweet those assembly line jobs are.
  - kortilla 5y ago
    But they are better jobs and they are voluntary employees. That’s pretty much by definition not slavery.
    - ChuckNorris89 5y ago
      Sure, nobody is putting a gun to your head, but if Foxconn being the only employer in the city and the other alternative is starving homeless, does it still count as having a choice? Maybe if we're being pedantic, but realistically that's modern economic slavery.
      - nottorp 5y ago
        > if Foxconn being the only employer in the city As far as i know Foxconn factories are cities. You don't look for a Foxconn ad in your city, you get on the train and relocate there. Wikipedia says: Number of employees 1,290,000 (2020). The largest Foxconn factory is located in Longhua Town, Shenzhen, where hundreds of thousands of workers (varying counts include 230,000, 300,000, and 450,000). [I live in a 400k city.] Another Foxconn factory "city" is located at Zhengzhou Technology Park in Zhengzhou, Henan province, where a reported 120,000 workers are employed as of 2012.
      - 6510 5y ago
        Its simple really, they might be happy with their job, we are not.
  - nottorp 5y ago
    > Do you claim those people are making choices of their own free will? Yes. > When they have no other option? Peasant's life was the other option. > They can't even change their government for christs sake And you can? I mean, beyond replacing a psychopath for another...
- glogla 5y ago
  Does the place where you work have so many suicides it installed nets, like Foxconn?
  - nottorp 5y ago
    > Does the place where you work have so many suicides it installed nets, like Foxconn? Research the thing. Back when the suicide "scandal" made the news, Foxconn had over 1 M employees. The suicide rate was actually lower than the average suicide rate in China. But since they had so many people, some of them were statistically bound to suicide for... whatever reasons people suicide for.
dr_dshiv 5y ago
Except it’s not slavery, which is in fact the key difference.
- kesor 5y ago
  It has a new name these days.
  - nottorp 5y ago
    If you put it like that, isn't having to stay employed with a large corp because otherwise you wouldn't be able to get decent health insurance terms slavery? How about tying green cards to a specific job so the people holding them have no negotiation power and their salaries stay low?
Aunche 5y ago
Spoken like someone who as never met a Chinese factory worker before. Today's Foxconn workers have much more comfortable lives than their parents who were working a factories making low quality trinkets. The generation before that were largely peasants who lived through famine. >printed dollars backed by nothing If it were backed by nothing they wouldn't accept it. Money can be exchanged for goods and services. China is receiving more steel, oil, and pork than ever by exchanging it with dollars.

by kesor 5y ago

nottorp 5y ago

Yeah those poor slaves queueing at Foxconn's gates to get a job assembling iphones for the evil american consumer. Because it pays a lot more than tending the rice fields like their parents. Just for the record, I'm eastern european and slaving for the evil american tech firms ;)

andrepd 5y ago
>Yeah those poor slaves queueing at Foxconn's gates to get a job assembling iphones for the evil american consumer. Because it pays a lot more than tending the rice fields like their parents. Unironically yes? Do you claim those people are making choices of their own free will? When they have no other option? They can't even change their government for christs sake, how can it be claimed they are engaging in a "free" market? You are very privileged that you can work from your bedroom and get a nice salary while living in a low cost of living area. Don't forget that, when you talk about how sweet those assembly line jobs are.
- kortilla 5y ago
  But they are better jobs and they are voluntary employees. That’s pretty much by definition not slavery.
  - ChuckNorris89 5y ago
    Sure, nobody is putting a gun to your head, but if Foxconn being the only employer in the city and the other alternative is starving homeless, does it still count as having a choice? Maybe if we're being pedantic, but realistically that's modern economic slavery.
    - nottorp 5y ago
      > if Foxconn being the only employer in the city As far as i know Foxconn factories are cities. You don't look for a Foxconn ad in your city, you get on the train and relocate there. Wikipedia says: Number of employees 1,290,000 (2020). The largest Foxconn factory is located in Longhua Town, Shenzhen, where hundreds of thousands of workers (varying counts include 230,000, 300,000, and 450,000). [I live in a 400k city.] Another Foxconn factory "city" is located at Zhengzhou Technology Park in Zhengzhou, Henan province, where a reported 120,000 workers are employed as of 2012.
    - 6510 5y ago
      Its simple really, they might be happy with their job, we are not.
- nottorp 5y ago
  > Do you claim those people are making choices of their own free will? Yes. > When they have no other option? Peasant's life was the other option. > They can't even change their government for christs sake And you can? I mean, beyond replacing a psychopath for another...
glogla 5y ago
Does the place where you work have so many suicides it installed nets, like Foxconn?
- nottorp 5y ago
  > Does the place where you work have so many suicides it installed nets, like Foxconn? Research the thing. Back when the suicide "scandal" made the news, Foxconn had over 1 M employees. The suicide rate was actually lower than the average suicide rate in China. But since they had so many people, some of them were statistically bound to suicide for... whatever reasons people suicide for.

dr_dshiv 5y ago

Except it’s not slavery, which is in fact the key difference.

kesor 5y ago
It has a new name these days.
- nottorp 5y ago
  If you put it like that, isn't having to stay employed with a large corp because otherwise you wouldn't be able to get decent health insurance terms slavery? How about tying green cards to a specific job so the people holding them have no negotiation power and their salaries stay low?

Aunche 5y ago

Spoken like someone who as never met a Chinese factory worker before. Today's Foxconn workers have much more comfortable lives than their parents who were working a factories making low quality trinkets. The generation before that were largely peasants who lived through famine. >printed dollars backed by nothing If it were backed by nothing they wouldn't accept it. Money can be exchanged for goods and services. China is receiving more steel, oil, and pork than ever by exchanging it with dollars.