Apple is under fire because they are making money and the labor unions cannot stand it. The unions want all production under their dominance, just like every governor wants it in their state, every mayor wants as much as he can get in his city. They want to replace the greed of Chinese manufacturers and politicians, with their greed. So those with an agenda are attacking Apple for using Chinese labor, even when they know, or should know, that it is impossible to meet the needs of a company like Apple, Dell, or HP in the US or any other nation with a independent mindset among the working population.
It is not how much the workers make in $US, but what it does to the standard of living. What most people do not realize is that you cannot say this is a valid wage and this is not. Workers around my part of the country make a living at $10-$14 starting wages. You go to many other parts of the country and those wages are not enough to survive on. If you were to demand that X workers would have to be paid wages comparable to those in cities like New York or Los Angeles, the price of everthing would skyrocket to where those not making those wages would be priced out of a living. There is a fallacy with the concept of a minimum wage that allows for a decent living. It does not take into account that when the local economy is depressed, those companies with a need to hire, will pay a going wage. If the local economy is booming, the local companies will pay more, because it takes more to attract good workers. If you raise the going wage to above a level that the local economy can support, businesses will usually close. It is not any use in raising the product price if no one can afford it. Another problem with minimum wages is that politicians often want to raise it for popular consumption. The price of new hires goes up, but the workers that have experience are suddenly being hurt. The wage increases, causes products to increase to compensate. Anyone making above minimum wage have their buying power reduced. It also is morale issue for those who are being usurped.
The workers in China are much like the young men and women that became the forefront of our efforts during WW2. They both were mostly from rural agriculture areas where there were no jobs, and little money. Not much of a future for them. They are recruited/enlisted by the government to go far from their homes to work long hard hours at a wage that seems enormous for the times. They all worked in conditions that seemed reasonable for the times and place. And often better than they were used to. Women were treated more like equals than they ever had. To those involved, their lives are forever changed, but in the long run, in a postive way.
The suicides at Foxconn are more than likely related to being homesick than any mistreatment. The working conditions are not such that would be acceptable in the US, but usually better than what they experienced gowing up. And a large portion of the workers are support family back 'on the farm'. And yet, so many of these people manage to make enough that they can afford to buy iPhones and iPads. They consider it worth a lot more to them than we do. It is mentioned the wage difference between China and Korea. In China, it is necessary for Foxconn to feed and shelter the workers. I doubt that the same conditions apply in Korea. And Korea is a huge industrialized nation that is further along than China in worker saturation. Worker saturation is what causes wages to go up, and it is happening to China now. A lot of companies are looking to move out of China because of worker saturation. These companies are the usual ones that get by with exploiting workers, not the ones like Apple.
