Victoria's Secret Sweatshops

The Victoria's Secret workers work 14 to 15 hours a day, from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 or 10:00 p.m, seven days a week, receiving on average one day off every three or four months. All overtime is mandatory, and workers are normally at the factory 98 to 105 hours a week. If that’s not bad enough managers and supervisors scream at the foreign guest workers to move faster to complete their high production goals.Workers who do not meet their production goals or make minor errors can be slapped and beaten. Besides being forced to work five or more overtime hours a day, the workers are constantly shortchanged on their legal overtime pay. Workers can get cheated up to $18.48 each week in wages due them. Although this might not seem like a lot of money, to these poor workers it is the equivalent to losing three regular days of wages each week. These workers are only given 3.3 minutes to sew a $14 Victoria’s Secret bikini while they are only paid four cents. The employees at Victoria’s Secret receive less than 3 percent of the retail price of the merchandise. Management arrested six workers who protested against them. A strike was later formed and management threatened workers to be deported back to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. If these workers are deported they will never be able to pay off their debts which can ruin their lives in their country.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-tasini/victorias-secret-slave-_b_74261.html

Speedo Sweatshops

Speedo is the top selling and best-known swimwear brand in the world and was an official sponsor of the 2008 Olympic Games in China but workers in China producing Speedo sporting goods are under abusive treatment. One worker said “what lies in front of us is a blanket of darkness. We have no hope.” Workers producing Speedo products were forced to work overtime during peak season. This can last up to nine months with a routine 14 hour shifts a day from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. seven days a week. Some employees went several months without a day off. Overtime is mandatory and there are sometimes 15 and 17 hours shifts in a day. There is a required 44 overtime hours per week which exceeds Chinas legal limit on overtime by 430 percent. One worker was forced to work a 23 hour shift at a molding machine where he actually shed tears because of the exhaustion he endured. He was terrified to stop for if he did his hands could be possibly crushed by the motion of the machine.



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2165761

Coca Cola Sweatshops

Coca-Cola leads factories in the abuse of workers' rights, assassinations, water privileges and worker discrimination. From 1989 to 2002, eight union leaders from Coca-Cola bottling plants in Colombia were killed after protesting the company's labor practices. Hundreds of other Coca-Cola workers who have joined or thought of joining the Colombian union “sinal trainal” have been kidnapped, tortured and detained by guards who were hired to intimidate workers to prevent them from unionizing. In India, Coca-Cola destroys local agriculture by claiming the country's water resources. In Plachimada, Kerala, Coca-Cola took more than1.5 million liters of deep well water, which they bottled and sold under the names Dasani and BonAqua. The groundwater that was taken was used up. This affected thousands of communities with water shortages and destroyed agricultural activity. The water that did remain became contaminated with high chloride and bacteria levels that lead to scabs, eye problems, and stomach aches in the local population. Coca-Cola is known as one of the most discriminatory employers in the world. In 2000, more than 1500 African-American employees in the U.S. sued the company for racial discrimination and in pay and promotions.


http://www.doublestandards.org/exchange1.html

Wal-Mart Sweatshops

Wal-Mart is the biggest corporation in the world. It owns more than 5,000 stores worldwide and has more than 1.3 million workers in the United States. This doesn’t include the millions of factory workers. Wal-Mart runs local supermarkets and small grocery stores out of business. There has also been a record of worker abuse in Wal-Mart as well. From forced overtime to sex discrimination, Wal-Mart is known for its sweatshop conditions. Other worker rights violations that have been found in factories that produce goods for Wal-Mart include locked bathrooms, starvation wages, pregnancy tests, denial of access to health care, and workers being fired and blacklisted if they try to defend their rights. Child labor and union busting are other issues relating with Wal-Marts poor reputation. Wal-Mart has also failed to provide their workers with health insurance. The reason why Wal-Mart is able to maintain low prices is because of the substandard labor conditions that employees work in overseas to produce goods. The company continues to demand lower prices from its suppliers which make workers conditions more abusive to meet Wal-Marts requirements. In 2005, the International Labor Rights Fund filed a lawsuit against Wal-Mart by it workers in more than 3 countries.

http://www.doublestandards.org/exchange1.html

Kader Industrial Fire

In Hong Kong, a company named Kader Industrial, was said to be the "worst fire in industrial history." On May 10, 1993, a sweatshop in Bangkok, Thailand collapsed within 20 minutes of being set. Viroj Yusak, a factory worker carelessly dropped a cigarette butt in a textile storeroom. With the doors locked no alarms or no sprinklers went off. With fake fire escapes, the factory was a death trap. The lack of fire escapes lead to many workers leaping out of fourth floor windows. People did this so that families can identify their bodies. 188 workers were killed in the sweatshop, and almost 500 suffered injuries. Only 14 males died in this tragedy because most workers were woman aged from 17 to 25. Some workers were as young as 14 years old. Many of these female workers did not receive money for maternity leave and some were forced to work 20 hours a day and sleep under their machines. Not only did the building's fire cause the death of the factory workers but the collapse of the building killed many other people as well.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kader_Toy_Factory_Fire

Doall Factories In El Salvador

Doall is a Korean owned company that sets up factories in El Salvador. All of these factories sew clothing for Liz Claiborne which the company has a contract with. Over 2,500 young women work in Doall's three factories. Two of them are located in the San Marcos Free Trade Zone and the other in the Progreso Industrial Park. Doall also has contracts with Leslie Fay, Chaus and Ann Taylor in which they sew for as well. Doall has been sewing for Liz Claiborne since 1992. Doall operates behind locked metal gates, barbed wire and tight armed security. No visitors are allowed at these factories either. In these factories workers work 13 to 15 hour work shifts and 85 to 92-hour work weeks. They are forced to work overtime and sometimes given mandatory night shifts working seven days a week. One worker complained that he only received three days off in a nine day period. Another worker complained that their feet swell up due to excessively long hours.

http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=440

Reebok Sweatshops

In sweatshops affiliated with Reebok, there are workers as young as 13 years old who work below the minimum wage and are forced to work overtime."Not only are Nike and Reebok violating the most basic tenets of Chinese labor law, they're also flagrantly violating their own codes of conduct," said Chan Ka Wai, assistant director of Hong Kong Christian Industrial Committee. Despite the underage labor, children are employed in the sewing,handwork and cutting departments of the factory. These factories constantly violate minimum wage laws and workers are forced to work up 72 hours a week. This violates the company's code for a 40 hour week and China's labor law, 44 hours a week. Those who refuse overtime can be fined, docked an entire day's pay, or even fired. Workers who become pregnant are often fired.This violates China's labor law granting workers maternity leave. Workers lose fingers and hands using the machines and are exposed to dust and chemicals that cause anemia and leukemia. The chemical is so toxic that it has been banned from the US and Europe. Even talking are punishable by fines and a deduction of pay. Workers have even reported to have been beaten on the job by security guards and verbal abuse by supervisors.


http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_45/b3706008.htm