William Pesek, a Bloomberg columnist, writes a piece for the Jakarta Globe about Chinese workers demanding raises. He mentions the walkout that shut down Honda’s Chinese production lines and the 24% pay raise to get people working again.
more money equals a better quality of life
A flock of suicides at Foxconn, a Taiwan owned company, also demonstrated Chinese worker unrest over low pay and long hours resulting in recent pay increases of 30% with promises of more to come. Since Foxconn turns out Apple, Dell and HP products, this could mean a jump in high-tech prices around the globe and/or slimmer profits for Wall Street giants.
Pesek says, “Chinese workers demanding higher wages, as they should, must have the folks at Wal-Mart Stores quaking. It’s hard to exaggerate the effect a big increase in Chinese pay would have on international profit margins and on inflation.”
What choice does China’s government have? Unrest crashed Imperial China in 1911 and changed the country again in 1949. Then after Mao’s death in 1976, China morphed into an open-market economy on steroids under Deng Xiaoping’s management. Recent news signals a possible change from an export-driven economy to one that sprouts from within.
See Deng Xiaoping’s 20/20 Vision or Why China is Studying Singapore
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Lloyd Lofthouse is the author of the award winning My Splendid Concubine and writes The Soulful Veteran and Crazy Normal.
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