English article from "The Hindu": http://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/workers-building-s...
"11 people were injured, 5 of them seriously"
http://www.thanhniennews.com/index/pages/20140109-11-injured...
While companies are saving by moving manufacturing plants, many people (millions) in Vietnam are going to experience higher standard of living. I say it's a win win.
"When the last tree is cut, the last river poisoned, and the last fish dead, we will discover that we can't eat money."
It wasn't about workers' rights, but something along those lines seems to fit.
When you have a country that starts to industrialize factory owners only have to offer wages twice what someone gets on the farm to get people to migrate from the communities they grew up in to the cities. As the factory owners profit from the cheap labor they spend some of the money on themselves, but also spend some of the money on building new factories and absorbing new labor. Eventually all the excess labor in the countryside is absorbed, and the factory owners have to start competing for new labor by raising wages. This is the same general pattern that happened in Britain then Japan then Korea and China, and seems to be just starting in Vietnam now. There are sometimes variations, such as the fact that rural wages were pretty high in the US due to lots of available land, or the Chinese residency permits system that artificially restricts who can move to the city and so started the rise in wages more quickly than would be "natural" at the expense of the people forced to live in the countryside. But then again the Party knows that its dissent among the people in easy marching distance of it's offices that it really has to worry about.
But getting back on track, even if the companies weren't greedy then creating new factories in Vietnam to create jobs for Vietnamese people jobs would be the altruistic thing to do. The difference would be that instead of dividends they would turn their profits into more investment so as to make development happen faster.
Which actually benefits us as the consumer. Would you prefer a less greedy corporation that goes where the most expensive labor is which then increases the cost of production which then increases the cost of the products you buy from said company?
Greed is what keeps prices low, and competition high.
I don't think Vietnam can compete with China until China stops treating its workers as slaves.
I guess some things will never change, unfortunately.
I hope someone gives these poor workers the decent wages and decent lives they deserve, and soon.
I feel this way too sometimes, but if you step back you realize things change all the time. In America people banded together into worker's unions which fought tooth and nail to be treated fairly. Unions in America clearly have some shortcomings, but it did manage to move the needle from Grapes of Wrath style living to a more equitable and humane existence for workers.
Clearly these workers (and elsewhere in Asia) are starting to organize. Perhaps they too can enjoy a larger portion of the fruits of their labour.
Of course, the downside of constant change is things can get worse too and it's often very difficult to know which direction makes things better and which direction will makes things worse. Indeed, most won't even agree on what is better and what is worse.
(edit: Irony, people. Irony.)
Avoid Irony/Sarcasm on the internet.
No one can read how hilarious I am in real life when it's in the generic font.
Leave internet irony and sarcasm alone!
We are not robots until proven otherwise by facial expressions and other physical properties.
Wait, is your post sarcasm? I know the one before the one before was, but I thought that was obvious.
Meanwhile, men attack scooters.
