Sweatshops

Several corporations and educational institutions in the United States buy their products from factories that have their workers working in conditions that would be considered substandard and illegal in the US. Workers work up to 18+ hour days in environments laden with hazardous chemicals and temperatures beyond normal human tolerances. Temperatures are commonly so high as to cause permanent injury and even death in some cases. US corporations place their production facilities in countries that have little to no regulation over employers or employees and more importantly over wages. It is the general consensus in developed countries that employing persons at sweatshops is cruel and inhumane.. Sweatshops are "a shop or factory in which employees work long hours at low wages under poor conditions"("sweatshops").

Many of the employees who spend time in these sweatshops often develop serious injuries or illness that leads to debilitation or death. Healthcare for these workers is also virtually non existent If a worker is injured and cannot work there is no compensation program and if a worker must take time off to seek medical treatment often they are replaced and lose their employment. Because of these practices, most workers choose to not seek medical or legal help under any circumstance. Most do not receive regular vaccinations that help their body fight against smallpox, whooping cough, tetanus, polio, and diphtheria . "A sweatshop factory brings visions of dangerous, filthy, and cramped conditions. Most workers receive very little in the way of wages. In Bangladesh and Myanmar, they pay ten to eighteen cents; in China, Pakistan, Vietnam, India, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia they pay twenty to sixty-eight cents per hour. Why do owners pay their workers so little? The only answer to this question is greed. The items made by these workers sell for sometimes hundreds of times the cost.

Many of these factories hire underage children. About 250 million children between the ages five and fourteen work in sweatshops. Half of these children are working full time and one third of them are working in extremely dangerous conditions. Many of these children begin working before the age of seven, tending to machines in the spinning mills and hauling heavy loads. To an employer the purpose of employing a child is not to train them, but to make their profits higher from the child's work. They care only about profits and not about the dangers of child labor. Child labor is "the abuse and misuse of young children at work. Child labor is exploiting children by giving them low wages or no wage at all, allowing them to work excessive hours, and in unsafe, unhealthy work environments. It causes permanent physical, psychological, intellectual, social, and moral damage leading towards death. Some children are forced to work fifteen-hour days. If a young child working that many hours were able to make up the sleep lost during the time they were working, it would take nearly a lifetime to make it all up.

The factories want as much work done as possible so they hire as many workers as possible. Most of these workers are underage, since they are cheap labor. Since the children are smaller, they can fit between and under machines, which is very dangerous. If children were not working on these machines, this child would not have fallen. Child labor brings in billions of dollars every year for factory owners. .The owners use the economies of scale to maximize their profits. They simply spread the small wages across as many workers as possible. Many workers work for wages that do not even cover their daily living expenses. There is no overtime pay, no hazard pay, no sick leave.

About 35 million soccer balls or 80% of the world's annual supply are produced in Pakistan. About one fourth of Pakistan's soccer balls were made by children that were working 8 to 12 hour days for 6 cents an hour. Many children knot carpets, stitch clothes, or soccer balls since their fingers are smaller. Adults would not be able to do these jobs since their fingers are bigger than a child's. Since the children are younger, the owners can tell them what to do easier than it would be to tell an adult. There was another incident where three-year-old Angelica Marachareo, from Ellis Island would pull apart petals, insert them in the center of a flower and glue it to a stem. She would make 540 of these flowers for five cents a day. If a whole family were to work from eight in the morning to nine at night, they could make 3168 roses and earn, $1.20, not even enough to make a meal for one person. If the wage they make is not enough for one person, how does a family survive?

The conditions in these factories are deplorable. They are unsanitary, and disease often runs rampant throughout the facilities. The chemicals used are more often than not dangerous if inhaled or ingested. The buildings are not adequately lit or ventilated. There are not adequate bathroom facilities and most factories only allow one bathroom break per day. Benefits such as heath insurance or a retirement plan are non