By John J. Sweeney
A century or so ago, as America created its industrial age, it was common business practice to hire new waves of immigrants to undercut wages for the rest. In the stockyards and mills and on railroad tracks, the newly arrived workers had no choice but to accept low pay and harsh conditions—and the capitalists who employed them exploited the situation mercilessly by lowering work and living conditions for all. When workers formed unions and struck for survival wages and hours, the bosses brought in violent thugs and replacements workers. For many, their only alternative was starvation.
Immigrant workers in this country still are exploited every day, and it’s still despicable. But today’s robber barons also can pit workers from other countries against U.S. workers without anyone crossing a border, thanks to corporate-driven globalization and complicit governments.
That’s what’s happening in China.
The Chinese government fails to protect workers’ rights and multinational companies doing business there take full advantage. They exploit Chinese workers miserably, paying as little as 15 cents to 50 cents an hour for work in intolerable conditions and denying workers the ability to come together to demand better treatment.
The abuse of Chinese workers results in pay so low and conditions so poor that production costs for Chinese-made goods are artificially low—low enough to constitute an unfair trade practice. Low-cost Chinese goods make the Wal-Marts of America rich but kill U.S. manufacturers, which can’t compete with product costs based on worker abuse. Chinese workers suffer. U.S. workers lose good jobs. Whole communities are devastated.
The AFL-CIO recently filed a petition with the U.S. Trade Representative demanding the Bush administration crack down on the Chinese government’s exploitation of workers and denial of internationally recognized workers’ rights described in Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974. That document authorizes the president to impose trade sanctions against countries engaging in "unreasonable trade practices."
How’s this for unreasonable?
The Chinese government and multinational companies exploit millions of child laborers, many of whom work in export factories.
They exploit millions of forced laborers—unjustly jailed prisoners and migrants without civil rights who work in bonded labor.
They deny workers the freedom to form independent unions.
They ignore the government’s own wage standards.
They do not enforce workplace safety and health standards, resulting in the highest rate of injuries and illnesses in the history of the world. The State Department says industrial accidents in China killed 126,760 workers last year.
Those Chinese workers are our brothers and sisters. When they are injured, we bleed. We all have a stake in freeing them from the tyranny of abuse, exploitation and denial of basic rights—and, in the process, saving U.S. jobs and strengthening our economy.
Please take a minute now to join us in demanding that the Bush administration accept our petition and take action to protect Chinese workers and U.S. jobs. Click to send a message to Congress and President Bush.
