Post 2

Amanda Reyna

AAS 340

The Topic of Sweatshops

            In Sweatshops Immigrants are treated unfairly they are over worked, and under paid what happen to the concept of labor laws?  Employees often work seven days a week sometime seventy hours with no overtime it's inhumane. Workers often don't take breaks because they are not paid hourly, but rather by the amount of clothing they make.

             For example: Helen Wong  first arrived in Oakland from Hong Kong in 1988 with her husband and five children. She quickly got a job in a U.S. garment shop  in a tiny, ten machine store front near City Hall. Speaking no English Helen took the job even if it was low pay. She worked at a piece rate making and average of one or two dollars  a hour working seven days a week with no over time (Pg. 226). Being an immigrant often brings fear to the workers  not knowing their rights or labor laws some may have not even applied.  Most workers  were paid under the table so there was no documentation of the long hours they had worked. Some individuals took home clothing to finish even after working such long days.

          I have a friend whose mother moved to the U.S. from Vietnam her name is Sue she was born In the united states. However when her mother first moved to the U.S she worked in a sweatshop for a few years specking very little English. Until she had meet Sues Father and they became married after having her. Sue had told me stories about her mother and how she had to work very hard to support them while her father was  working only part time and going to school full time.  Her mother told her: "sometimes I, worked 12 hours a day without taking a break because I wanted to get as much garments as I could done. The working area is very small with many people it got very hot at times, and sometimes I took work home with me".  When Sue's Father received his PH D he became a doctor, and leased a business for his wife a Kiosk in Oakridge Mall in San Jose, CA  where she sold hats called JorCal it's fairly successful she's been doing it for about two years now.

             The garment industry is the largest manufacturing sector in San Francisco and employs over 25,000 workers.  Ninety percent of the works are women, and in San Francisco over 80 percent are not English speakers. Less than eight percent of the workers are unionized (Pg.226). Less than 8 percent part of a union that is ridicules. The sweatshop industry's went beyond U.S. border.  American consumers sports clothing went anywhere from Hong Kong to Mexico, Haiti, South Korea, the Philippines, Guatemala , and Costa Rica.  The Industry made a abundant amount of profit; considering how low the workers are paid,  the prices clothing was sold, and how much it cost to make.

            However jobs where cut in the U.S.  due to not being able to pay the employees at   third world wages.  The labor industry is cheaper in globalization. "Koret's San Francisco employed over three hundred workers making $6  an hour, as oppose to  a Guatemalan seamstresses making and average of $1.50 in an eight hour day...(Pg. 228)". This wages makes a big difference in profits made. Could you imaging doing that kind of labor for that little pay? In California minimum wage is at $8 an hour I believe; and that's not even enough money for food,  rent,  the price of College, and text books I got finical aid to help me.

            In conclusion it's unmoral for anybody immigrant or not to work so hard for such little pay, it's almost equivalent to slavery. Working over eight hours a day with no overtime making bellow minimum wage without taking a lunch or a break.  The employees working in sweatshops are treated unfairly it's depressing to think that they make the clothes I'm wearing where made under those conditions. But I suppose somebody has to do it  however they should have at least health care benefits and get paid more.