Abstract
The campaign of New York Times journalist Charles Duhigg and his colleagues against the outsourcing of iPhone assembly to China through the Taiwanese company Foxconn was waged on behalf of US workers because it resulted in domestic job losses and high unemployment. While disputing the critical assumption that it is ‘only about cheap labor’, these campaigning journalists also showed some concern for Chinese workers:
The Taiwanese company has a million workers, many willing to live in company dorms, work midnight shifts and spend 12 hours in a factory, six days a week. Chinese workers are cheaper than their American counterparts — but just as important, they are more flexible and plentiful, and thousands can be hired overnight.1
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Notes
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© 2016 Jim McGuigan
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McGuigan, J. (2016). Cool Business. In: Neoliberal Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137466464_4
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