Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

[John H.]

And why the Chinese obviously have no OSHA; anyone familiar with stamping presses and part transfer mechanisms will find this Chinese stamping operation simply terrifying .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fnVhDb-u8g#

[Chris E.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

Oh my................

[Keith B.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

am I seeing that correctly. the workers sitting under the press while its coming down to stamp out that piece

[Rick S.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

That's scary. I am sure the guy on the right thinks he could be replaced by a shorter guy who wouldn't have to bend over each cycle. So he isn't going to say a thing.

[Bruce B.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

It doesn't look like CHOSA has visited the plant lately.

After being around stamping equipment for many years, long ago, it is hard to believe that this type of operation exists in any civilized (?) country.

[Valeria H.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

This is one of the reasons the Chinese government does not allow unauthorized people near or around their factories. Also, they dump massive amounts of toxic wastes into their rivers creating an 8x higher than normal GI cancer rate at the deltas.

China is on my list of "Interesting to visit but I would not want to live there".
Valeria

[Michael G.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

This is the definition of a very high pressure job...bet the press doesn't even stop for shift changes....

[Stewart A.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

Life's cheap when there is over a billion people living in poverty ! The strange thing is they get annoyed when you question there safety. I got the silent treatment when I asked about the guys working without scaffold. They never returned my phone calls. Told me I was a trouble maker !! Stewy

[Chuck W.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

And why the Chinese obviously have no OSHA; anyone familiar with stamping presses and part transfer mechanisms will find this Chinese stamping operation simply terrifying .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fnVhDb-u8g#

I worked at a Chevy pressed metal facility for nearly 10 years. Wow is all that can be said. I was talking to a friend of mine who was in China a few months ago and witnessed them installing a press. They were removing an old foundation to make way for the new one. They had fifty (50) little China guys with hammers and short lengths of rebar wacking away at the old foundation to remove it. No safety glasses just bit sof concrete flying everywhere.

It is like looking back in time. Someday the pendulum will swing, I just hope that we are not all broke by the time it happens.

[Michael G.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

There was a time in the US when our immigrant grandfathers were the cheap limitless supply of labor now seen in China. There will be a day when it all balances out, but , unless our trade policies become as ruthless and one-sided as the Chinese, manufacturing jobs in the US will be extinct long before that balance is struck.

[Chuck S.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

...Someday the pendulum will swing...

Don't hold your breath on China changing, Chuck.

If there is to be change in Chinese society to improve work safety, as there was in the US and Europe during the industrial revolution and later, there has to be somewhere in the society a compassion felt for your fellow man. Also, the society must have the freedom to express that compassion as activism. China does not have a history of either condition.

Greed insulates manufacturers from feeling any such compassion, but activism pressured our government to take notice and force change. In this country, the big changes by activism that come to mind were the end of slavery, the end of draconian labor practices, the end of discrimination against women, and the end of racial discrimination (to the degree such can be controlled by government).

Some scoff when told that America is a Christian nation, and yet it was Christian values from Europe that we were founded on, and a freedom to express compassion for others that conformed our nation to Christian values. Those values remain strong in our society, but would better be described today as "morality"...most don't know where those values came from anymore; now, it's just "doing the right thing".

[Henry S.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

Just this morning in our local paper there was the story of how China toy makers are now substituting cadmium in place of lead in producing children's jewelry. Stated thye "Most contanimated piece analysed in lab testing performed by the AP contained a startling 91% cadmium by weight. The other trinkets all purchased at national and regional chains or franchises tested at 89%, 86% and 84% by weight." The picture accompanying the story was one of a reindeer charm for a childs charm braclet. Imagine the sight now as most toys at one time or another always find their way into a child's mouth.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/WellnessNews/wireStory?id=9527916

Back in 2007 when the Utah mine collapsed and trapped those 6 miners there were stories going around about the unsafe conditions in China mines and how many were killed every year. Mindboggling.

[Stuart F.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

There are some advantages to having more small agile workers, i.e. we used to enjoy pictures of them crawling into the air boxes of our GM/EMD 645 Diesel engines to clean, inspect, and change water jumper tubes. I'm sure the same is true with many shipboard engines as well. I supervised some construction projects in Thailand where the contractor employed mostly Chinese skilled (?) labor. They used to frustrate the heck out of me as they enjoyed screwing things up by misreading plans, just to show me how well they could repair/fix their mistakes; seemon? Goodas gnoo.

Stu Fox

[Jack H.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

It is like looking back in time. Someday the pendulum will swing, I just hope that we are not all broke by the time it happens.

And, it's not that much better in Taiwan where freedom has prevailed for about 50 years now!

You'll see workers moving wheelbarrow loads of concrete up external scaffolding made from bamboo by hand (sometimes +10 stories) because that's cheaper than hiring a central crane...

Back to the mainland with workers sitting beneath the press to manually unload stampings, they're MUCH better off than those living/working on a People's Collective farm/ranch...

[Gene M.]

Re: Why It's Cheap To Manufacture In China...

WE AS AMERICANS HAVE THE OPTION TO NOT PURCHASE ANYTHING made in china.

Was that loud enough? When is America going to wake up?

If we are willing to enjoy our life style we should be prepared to pay our fellow American a bit more for MADE IN USA to be on the label.

What if your job, livelihood went to china?