Sweatshops refer to working environment that disregard workers’ basic rights. They are characterized by low pay for more work. Workers in these stations work for very long hours. They also work in very unsafe and unhealthy environments. In addition, the owners of these sweatshops have policies that are structured in a way that restricts workers’ rights and freedoms. These include limited wage rises and lack of rest days. According to Lombardo (2016), most sweatshops are found in Asia, Africa and the Pacific regions (Lombardo, 2016) . However, large corporations have come under great criticisms for violating basic workers’ rights. Most organizations in the apparel industries have over time been criticized for benefiting largely from selling goods made in sweatshops. Such organizations include Wal-Mart, Nike and Liz Claiborne. In addition, most American garment industries tend to violate two or more of the basic labor laws (Lombardo, 2016) .
A study conducted in Los Angeles in 2000 revealed that 98% of the garment factories violated the set health and safety studies. This is also seen in manufacturing industries such as phone manufacturing. In 2006, Apple Inc. is believed to have benefited from sweatshops in China. In these sweatshops, workers toiled for many hours while manufacturing iPod product. Upon conducting its investigations, Apple Inc. established that there was a gap in the outsourcing of companies in foreign lands. This created a loophole where the outsourced company would exploit workers for maximal benefits. This compares largely to the 1911 incident where owners of companies outsourced people to run their companies. These people ended up violating basic workers’ rights (Cornel University, 2020) .
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In Asia, children as young as 6 years are expected to work for 13 hours. The same situation is seen in Latin America, Bangladesh and India where the labor force is mainly composed on young people. In terms of wages, the average hourly wage in China is about 74 cents. A woman who has sewn an NBA jersey which is sold at $120 is paid only 24 cents for her work. In addition, illegal Mexican workers are largely exploited in America. They are paid low wages by factories. This happens under threats of deportation (benredskin7, 2013) . Moreover, pregnant women are fired and are not given maternity leave. The owners argue that such a worker is unproductive at their expense (Lombardo, 2016) .
Modern sweatshops are a big problem. This is because many companies benefit at the expense of the workers. Legislation is one way to alleviate this problem. This is by governments raising the minimum wages. It also entails slapping organizations with huge penalties for violating labor laws. Further, there is a need to strengthen workers’ unions.
References
Cornel University. (2020). The 1911Triangle Factory Fire . Retrieved from Cornel University: http://trianglefire.ilr.cornell.edu/story/sweatshopsStrikes.html
Lombardo, C. (2016). 26 Stunning Modern Day Sweatshops Statistics and Facts. Vision Launch .
