Posted on 12/21/2007 9:32:26 AM PST by kellynla
WASHINGTON – As consumer safety recalls of Christmas products made in China continue at a torrid pace, a new report shows the average Chinese worker making toys is paid a meager 36 cents an hour – just 2.5 percent of what U.S. toy manufacturers pay domestically.
Today, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission announced the latest recall of a Christmas import – a holiday candle set that tips over and whose exterior coating is flammable. The snowman and Christmas tree candles were manufactured in China.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission warned the candles should not be used because of the fire hazard they pose. Instead, they should be returned to the retailer for a full refund.
Chinese-made toys accounted for 94 percent of the CPSC recalls this year. Most of the recalls were related to excessive and dangerous levels of lead used in cheap paints.
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
American made toys:
http://www.toysamerican.com/
http://www.turnertoys.com/made-in-USA/american-made-toys.htm
Can’t wait for the shills to show up and defend this.
Why would you put someone/something you love in jeopardy?
Forget the shills. Will the MSM pick this up?
Flammable candles -- there's a first.
Probably not.
There are lots of nations that had businesses that used to pay like this. They were among the best jobs available, and helped give people a an alternative to trudging behind a water buffalo.
In those nations, many jobs now pay much more, the next generations have better hope of education, and the manufacturing is much more skilled and high-value.
China’s problem is government, not the fact that the market for labor is cheap.
Unless people are enslaved to take these jobs, I have no problem at all.
If the cost of living in the US and China were equivalent, this comparison would be relevant. A far more relevant question is whether or not the Chinese factory workers are earning enough to provide for their families. In general, they're not -- and that's a far more morally-compelling statistic.
I’m far more concerned about China supplying weapons to our enemies and stealing our technology than I am about the wages of the people producing the garbage they send to us.
However, I do stay away from cheap Chinese goods which have been shown or appear to be toxic, dangerous, or otherwise unacceptably substandard. "Made in China" to me means "buyer beware" even moreso than usual.
As for the 'American jobs' argument, don't blame China or the consumer. 100% of the blame belongs to the government for imposing tax and regulatory systems which are domestically ruinous, especially under the conditions of international trade (where a tax arbitrage opportunity is presented). Labor costs are a small fraction of the picture, basically negligible compared to taxes. Replacing income (including corporate) taxes with a flat consumption tax would mean an equal levying of taxes upon domestic and foreign goods and labor. Outsourcing and offshoring would reverse themselves overnight.
“the average Chinese worker making toys is paid a meager 36 cents an hour –”
And that would be 36 cents more than these workers would make if they wern’t working anywhere.
Having started out my first job in Kentucky in 1947 at 10-cents an hour, these guys are ahead of me—starting out.
10 cents in 1947 is a dollar now.
“And that would be 36 cents more than these workers would make if they wern’t working anywhere”
Brillant! LMAO
I recall in the 80s a big fuss over Nike in Vietnam paying workers something like 10c per hour. What the article didn’t state is that in the Vietnamese economy at the time, the average worker made 2c per hour, so working for Nike greatly increased their lifestyle and caused there to be high demand for Nike jobs in Vietnam.
yeah, those workers dorms are luxury condos too
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