China’s Workers Rising

March 24, 2015

Cathy Walker

Canadian Auto Workers (CAW)

Director, Health & Safety Department (retired)

To: Dr. Xinying Hu’s class

LBST 330-3

Simon Fraser University

Does increased

prosperity lead to

improved health and

working conditions in

China?

Whose prosperity?

Whose health?

Whose working conditions?

What are the two types

of people in the world?

And which are you?

Apple computers

Apple iPad

Who got an iPhone for

Christmas?

Who wants an iWatch?

It’s not just Apple

We’ll focus on Apple because they are

the biggest, but the same pattern

repeats for the other big electronics

manufacturers

Who makes these great

gadgets?

Foxconn workers in

Guangdong, China

Motherboards etc.

What about China

before electronic

gadgets?

1927 workers fought

back: Shanghai and

Anyuan miners’ strike

1949 – 1978

workers’

state?

Urban danwei (work

unit) system

Lifetime employment guarantee

Housing provided and subsidized

Food and fuel subsidized

Medical care system provided

Public school education free

No firings or negative discipline

Positive examples such as model workers

Workers had a lot of

power in a socialist

society Unions didn’t have

to protect people

from firing or unfair

discipline

Management was

paternalistic

Wage system was

very egalitarian

But with later

privatization of the

SOEs: mass layoffs

Workers have been

striking in China

for years

Strikes aren’t illegal in China

In 1982 the right to strike was removed from

the constitution but there’s no prohibition on

strikes in law

After reform, strikes about unpaid wages

and pensions, unfair layoffs, corruption

Now, as the income gap widens in China,

there is more and more resentment

1989 Tiananmen

It was workers who

manned the

barricades on the

streets leading to

Tiananmen to protect

the students from the

army

And it was they who

died in greater

numbers than the

students

Learn from Daqing

Fighting back in Daqing

Daqing, 50,000 oil workers demonstrated, 2002

Formed Daqing Provisional Union of Retrenched

Workers

What’s happening

today?

Many SOEs (State-Owned Enterprises)

still good places to work.

Joint Ventures with foreign capital,

depending on where and the industry,

can sometimes be good places to work.

Private companies, wholly owned by

foreigners or domestic, can be very

unpleasant places to work. Workers

lives can be miserable.

Shandong province

heavy truck plant; SOE

GM Shanghai: 5,500

workers; joint venture

Since 1990s

Manufacturing Boom

Workers needed

Like the English Industrial Revolution,

workers recruited from the countryside

China has had the biggest labour

migration in human history

Most workers have

migrated from the

countryside

Why move? Life on the

farm is tough

Government Response to

job security concerns

2008 Labour Contract Law

Provided for mandatory labour

contracts between individual workers

and employers

After two short term contracts, workers

had no expiry date labour contract

Word spread among workers about

these new worker rights

What happened in

October 2008?

What happened in

October 2008?

Worldwide recession and it hit China

particularly hard

Why?

Because of production

for export

However, China recovered much more

quickly than elsewhere because of

government investment, stimulating

the economy and providing

employment

But this led to serious reflection about

the need to develop the domestic

economy and domestic consumption

How do workers get

higher pay?

How do workers get

higher pay?

Strike for higher pay

How do workers get

higher pay?

Strike for higher pay

Increases in minimum wage,

– context is interest by government in social

stability, that is, in preventing strikes

Increases to Minimum

Wage in China

Government’s Employment Promotion

Plan minimum wages are supposed to

increase in accordance with local living

standards by at least 13 percent

through 2015 and be no less than 40

percent of the average local wages.

Minimum wages under such policies

increased by an average 12.6 percent

rate between 2008-2012.

Increases to

Minimum Wage

The 2011-15 Five Year Plan stipulates

an average increase of 13% per year.

In 2013 the minimum wage increased

16% and in 2014 13.4%. While these

base wages are still low, these

increases are important.

Where did the pressure for such

increases come from?

Foxconn

Enormously profitable Taiwanese

company

More than 1,000,000 workers in China

Most Foxconn factories

in SE cities

Most SE plants

Low wages

Poor benefits

Long hours

Forced overtime

Monotonous work

Strict discipline

Called ‘blood and sweat’ shops in China

Southern Weekly

undercover report, 2010

Story picked up by rest of media in

China and reports were closely

followed

Shocked the nation

People were glued to their television

sets and newspapers

Foxconn was roundly condemned and

many did not attribute the ‘blood and

sweat’ shop conditions to Foxconn

alone, but abhorred the conditions in

so many factories

Workers finally got a

30% - 70% wage

increase

Not because of the effort of the union

in the workplaces because it was a

fake union run by relatives of

managers; it was public pressure

Not only product knock-offs are fakes

Specific ill health

problems at Wintek,

Apple supplier

N-Hexane

Why? It evaporates faster than

alcohol so company could speed up

production

137 workers chemically poisoned

Wintek workers

Problems began in 2009, became

public in 2010, company said stopped

using n-hexane in 2009 but one worker

died

Workers offered compensation

Where does much

environmental ill health

come from?

From the workplace

Toxins and contaminants are most

concentrated in the workplace and are

exported to the surrounding

environment

Workers are indeed the ‘canaries in

the coal mines’

Explosion at Foxconn

in Chengdu, May 2011

killed 4, injured 18

Factory made iPads

Polishing iPads

Aluminum dust was explosive

Video of Foxconn

workers in Chengdu

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2012/0

1/25/business/100000001313019/mad

e-in-china.html

Made in China

Behind Apple’s products, harsh

working conditions

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKB

Y94l0ewo

PBS: workers in China

Since 2010 wage

increases, production

has shifted

Why?

Wages are cheaper

Foxconn plants moving inland

And other companies on the coast are

manufacturing Apple parts

For example, Pegatron, another

Taiwanese company is manufacturing

in Shanghai

China Labor Watch

reports on Pegatron

http://www.chinalaborwatch.org/report/68

Pegatron and overtime

Average work week: 60+ hours a

week

52% of workers more than 90 hours

overtime a month

Why? Wages aren’t high enough so

workers work overtime in over to meet

basic living standards.

BBC report in 2014 reduced overtime

worked.

But most workers don’t

despair, they fight back

Honda auto parts plants workers

organized in the summer of 2010

They had been working alongside

Japanese workers paid many times

(50X) what they received

So they organized and

struck for change &

improvements

The parts plants

workers stuck together

Effect of Just-in-time

production: shut down the

Honda assembly plants

They received top level

support

Premier Wen Jiabao

Urged better treatment for the nation's

vast army of migrant labourers.

“Rural migrant workers are the main

army of the contemporary Chinese

industrial workforce. Our wealth and

our tall buildings are all distillations of

your hard work and sweat,” Wen told

a group of migrant workers in Beijing,

the People's Daily reported the

following day.

Wen was the first high ranking official

to comment publicly about strikes and

the current labour situation.

At the end of the meeting, which got

top billing on national TV, he said,

“The government and all parts of

society should treat young migrant

workers as they would treat their own

children.”

The Honda parts workers

won a 24% wage increase

Negotiated by Renmin University professor

Photo: Nov. 2009 conference organized by

Chair of the Guangzhou Trade Unions.

Workers can communicate

by cell phone:

voice or text

Strikes spread to other

Honda parts plants and

they won 45% increase

Workers can communicate

through the internet

And the strikes spread

elsewhere

E.g. Tianjin Mitsumi Electric workers

Support for strikes?

Why now?

Wages have fallen from 17% of total

economic output in 1980 to 11% in

2008, creating resentment among

workers who feel they are owed a

bigger share of China’s new wealth.

At the same time there are many more

wealthy people. The gap between rich

and poor is as much as the U.S.

Gap between rich and

poor enormous

China’s Gini Coefficient,

20 years ago: 0.45

2012: 0.73

(0 is best, 1 is worst)

Top 1% owns 1/3

of wealth

Bottom quarter of

population own

1% of the wealth

In Guangdong Province

alone in 2010

There were 90 work stoppages to

demand wage increases mainly in joint

ventures or auto parts and electronics

industries of the Pearl River Delta

(near Hong Kong)

Today Chinese workers are

fighting back

Number of protests (gov’t calls them ‘mass incidents’)

continues to grow

2005: 87,000

2008: 127,000

2009: 240,000

Typically fighting expropriation of homes and land for resource

developments (dams, mines etc.) or construction

Industrialized regions 50% of ‘mass incidents’ were over wage

arrears, workplace closures, layoffs

2014 report says 2010, 2011 and 2012 leading years for mass

incidents, numbers growing

Today, in some areas,

workers have more power

Elimination of the agricultural tax (over

5 years, now completely gone)

Migrant workers still have title to land

and the right to return

After being cheated in the economic

meltdown in fall 2008-early 2009,

many went home and stayed

Thus creating the most important

weapon labour has, a labour shortage

Those that returned to

the city (or never left)

Have seen Paris and don’t want to go

back home

They live in the cities and want a better

life:

– Housing, not just dormitories

– With kitchens, not just cafeteria food

– Consumer goods like what they produce

In order to achieve these goals they

need higher wages.

Since 2010 wage

increases, production

has shifted

Why?

Wages are cheaper

Foxconn plants moving inland

And other companies on the coast are

manufacturing Apple parts

For example, Pegatron, another

Taiwanese company is manufacturing

in Shanghai

China Labor Watch

reports on Pegatron

http://www.chinalaborwatch.org/report/68

Pegatron and overtime

Average work week: 60+ hours a

week

52% of workers more than 90 hours

overtime a month

Why? Wages aren’t high enough so

workers work overtime in over to meet

basic living standards.

BBC report in 2014 reduced overtime

worked.

Today the strikes and

demonstrations

Are by employed workers

And are not just fighting for unpaid

wages, to receive the minimum wage,

to receive pay for overtime worked

But are about real increases, real

improvements to wages and working

conditions

Labour shortages and labour courage

have brought this about

Reported

strikes

SOE miners struck over unpaid

wages in Shandong Province,

January, 2015: 5 months back pay

200 strikes

and protests a

month, 2015

Up from 60 a month

two years ago

Geoffrey Crothall,

China Labour Bulletin

(Globe & Mail, March

19, 2015)

http://maps.clb.org.hk/st

rikes/en Yue Yuan Strike, Dongguang

Hangzhou workers

struck Hewlett Packard

January 2015

Issues for HP Workers

on 3 week strike

Employees at the networking

equipment manufacturer were

particularly opposed to:

– the nomination of a new chairman

– the firing of a worker representative

and demanded more involvement in

company management and decision

making.

There are many

more workers than employers

Who will lead the

Chinese workers?

What about unions in China?

There’s one union, the All-China

Federation of Trade Unions which in

practice, varies widely according to the

industry or location.

ACFTU

One party and one

union

All-China

Federation of

Trade Unions

No independent

unions

“30 years ago everything was made in

Japan; 20 years ago everything was

made in Singapore and Taiwan; 10

years ago everything was made in

China; and now everything is made in

Vietnam, Cambodia and Bangladesh.”

Unions in the past:

1949-1978, Role:

Organized the ping pong tournaments

Helped out sick people

Promoted production and model workers

Promoted good nutrition “The union gave us eggs.”

How should people in

Canada respond?

By communicating with the ACFTU,

engaging in exchanges and dialogue

By being frank about how unions work

in Canada in a capitalist society: how

we organize workers; how we

represent workers on the shop floor;

how we bargain contracts; and how we

strike to win our demands from

employers

Vancouver & District

Labour Council

Visited Beijing in 2006

At the same time as the Walmart

organizing

Visited their

workplaces

Met new friends

Beijing MFTU Visited

Vancouver in 2007

We gave them a warm welcome, gave

them presentations and training

And we took them to a

picket line

Beijing MFTU

BEIJING, Sept. 1, 2010 (Xinhuanet) -- Amid rising concerns over trade

unions' role in better protecting workers' rights and interests, the Beijing

municipal trade union's move to liberate grassroots trade union chairs from

their economic dependence on employers marks an important step forward.

The capital's trade union will establish a special fund to pay grassroots

[workplace] trade union leaders. That will hopefully make grassroots trade

unions more independent in their negotiations with employers, when workers'

rights and interests are violated.

Before the 1980s, State-owned enterprises offered welfare packages to take

care of almost everything in workers' daily lives. Trade unions then were

actually the ones providing welfare services. Now, different forms of private

businesses have become an important part of the country's economy.

Employers can ignore or even violate the rights and interests of workers

when their major concern is to pursue maximum profits. There are instances

of employers firing trade union leaders who pressured them over workers'

rights and interests. Trade union leaders can even side with employers

instead.

As such, the Beijing union is working for the direct election of union leaders or

have such leaders sent by higher-level unions. This will help ensure that they

will be paid not by employers, but by unions. The leaders will then have less

to fear of in helping the workers. Despite all possible resistance, this plan is to

be put into practice.

BC Federation of Labour

and VDLC visited in

summer 2014

Enjoyed Chinese

culture

Had many interesting

meetings

Harvard’s Elaine Bernard

and UCLA’s Kent Wong:

both heads of

labour studies programs

“China has undergone tremendous change in the

past few decades…In this context of change,

would not more worker-to-worker and union-to-

union exchange be positive? Through more

dialogue with Chinese workers and unions, the

…labour movement could promote mutually

beneficial labour solidarity, move beyond the

cold war and unilateralism, and refocus attention

on the domestic and global corporations and

associated institutions that are, in fact, the main

threat to workers throughout the world.”

China has many

challenges

And a good opportunity

to build many

successes in wages and

working conditions,

occupational health and

safety, the environment,

and a return to a more

egalitarian society

In the Year of the Sheep

and beyond

There are

better

ways to

get to

school

Please vote “yes” for

more and better transit

Thanks very much