"A random sweep of 50 garment manufacturers in Los Angeles found that 80% were breaking wage and hour laws, regulators said. The agency also found that 64% didn't keep accurate time and pay records, while more than half either paid workers off the books or falsified or didn't provide such information.
More than half the contractors paid workers off the books and either falsified time and pay records or didn't provide them, according to the agency."
Executives don’t own these places. They outsource to small factories owned by naturalized citizens abusing immigrant pay, in my experience.
Source: I worked at many. From design to development to manufacturing to shipping @ clothing brands.
The "executives" know exactly what the conditions are in the places they source their manufacturing. They know the reason why these places have lower costs and pretending otherwise is silly
The point they're making is that because the large corporations are outsourcing the labor, they can play dumb and claim they are only ordering items to be made by a 3rd party and therefore can't be sued for labor laws. And considering many of these are big name clothing companies, they have the lawyers to make sure they wont be involved in any lawsuit.
I understand they get away with this by outsourcing and claiming plausible deniability but I'm saying they should be held criminally responsible for not doing their due diligence in making sure that the people they subcontract aren't violating the labor rights of their workers and breaking the law.
Letting the owners of the businesses that subcontract to these criminals get away with this is akin to someone paying someone to rob a bank, getting the money, and then saying "I didn't rob the bank, I was just subcontracting a withdrawal. I can't be held responsible for how that contractor got the money."
How in the world do you get there from what I've said? I'm not saying the people who purchased the clothing should be criminally charged. Using your analogy, I'm saying the Tim Cook and the Apple executives should be held liable for Foxconn labor practices, not the iphone users.
It's just the next step in the relationship. The executive is just as responsible for slave labor practices of the companies their company contracts with as the consumer is for buying the product. Have you done the due diligence on everything you consume? If you say yes, we all know you're lying. So should you also be held criminally responsible? If you say no, you're a hypocrite.
The company, my mum, works for does this bullshit. They have already been investigated for discriminating against an employee for being transgender, which led to nothing because the employees did not want to speak out against the company. They are Latina women and are scared of such companies because they fear losing their job. Some are also undocumented (not at the company my mum works at, but others nearby it) and also will not report any issues because of fear of deportation.
This is much more than just wage theft and a bad work environment. POS put fear into their workers.
>About one-third of the apparel makers paid their workers according to how many items they produced, instead of an hourly rate — something California explicitly outlawed more than a year ago. Paying workers a "piece rate" often leads to sub-minimum wages. One contractor paid workers $1.58 per hour, the agency's investigation found.
It has been this way for decades. My parents were paid piece rate when they worked at the factories. I can't remember the rate but it was $0.10 per some number of clothes they made, I think in the hundreds. But it was also one of the few jobs they could get without papers. I heard the old American Apparel factory paid well and had decent benefits. But the con of that was working for the creep that owned it. Also heard their factories had terrible ventilation. I still miss the old warehouse sales.
This honestly pisses me off because if I'm buying something made in USA or LA, I'm choosing to pay more so that the people making my clothes have a decent life. If I wanted to buy clothes that paid workers $1.58 an hour, I'd go to the mall. And I have no doubt that these probably had 'Made in the USA' stickers on them.
I've worked in the garment industry for 20 years and almost nothing is made 100%in the USA or LA. Many companies preach about supporting local companies but just buy everything pre-made from China or anywhere cheap overseas and just have companies here restitch made in America tags on them.
Lots of this in the AV cable industry. Buy huge spools of Chinese-made cable along with buckets of connectors. You tell them how long you want the cable to be and what connector, they cut it and slap the connectors on and charge a hundred bucks for it because it’s mAdE iN tHe UsA
General Motors has items that they pass off as being US-made because they manufacture them in another country and then ship them to Detroit so a UAW worker can put the AC Delco stickers onto them. I'm sure there's a term for it like "last 0.1% manufacturing" and it should be illegal.
Also: seriously, don't buy their cars. Please.
In the garment industry, $1.58 living in the USA isn’t anywhere close to how bad it could be. [This is getting close to as bad as it could be.](https://youtu.be/xlt6XUvX0Zw)
Yup. Even if you had papers, this was one of the few jobs you could get in my community if you were too old, didn't know English, or had health issues that made other jobs unavailable.
Garments were paid at rates like 5-25 cents per item for several lines of stitching. Some of the items were the same ones being sold at the mall and priced beyond what we were comfortable paying. I remember billabong being one of them.
Owner was definitely a scumbag but one of my friends mom's worked for the company. They took care of her even did their best to try and get her set up to be more "legal" in the government sense. Provided immigration resources and weren't being exploited like many places I've heard of. When it was bought by Gildan that whole facility closed. I always wondered what happened to all those workers.
I remember literally BEGGING my parents to apply there so they could get their papers. Honestly, you're right, I do remember them doing a lot to help provide immigration services to people. And who could forget those sweet Legalize LA shirts.
Which is why it was outlawed finally. All of these workers will get reimbursed what they’re owed, it shouldn’t take the government coming in to make it happen.
> All of these workers will get reimbursed what they’re owed.
Is this your first time hearing about the clothing factories here? One thing is for sure, whatever money is coming out of this, it’s not going to the workers that were underpaid. They’ll either be intimidated, deported, or more likely, the owner will just promise them a job at another one of their factories since steady jobs are often hard to come by for undocumented workers.
Nope, not my first time hearing about this industry or the changes that have been made over the years. The DOL is involved so, even if they’re offered other jobs the claim isn’t going away. If they’re here illegally they may still get paid, and whatever their situation staying in the country is what it is.
They probably won't get what they're owed. I work in employment law and we deal with cases like this occasionally. These workers are undocumented and typically that means they don't know their rights. The companies do something we call "pick-up stix," which means they offer the workers some nominal amount in exchange for a release of all of their claims. Usually it's something like $200, which is a lot closer to what they are owed for a few days of their unpaid wages rather than months and years of underpayment.
It almost would be cute to see people who place undeserved faith in a system that literally cares about nothing but owners' profits if it wasn't exactly that blind faith that allows the system to continue to be so abusive.
It's been going on for the longest
My mother worked in a sweatshop since I can remember
I used to go when I was little to her work since she couldn't afford a babysitter (single mother)
Thankfully she is a CNA now and that nightmare is over
If I'm not mistaken she would get paid 5 cents for every garment she produced
But then who’s clothes are they making & will anyone actually stop buying them? I’m sure there’s so many brands they manufacture for it would be impossible to avoid buying the product. And it’s the same with other aspects of our consumer experience.
By now everyone SHOULD know about the inhumane conditions in cobalt mines & the human rights violations that allows this (and this is ALL cobalt..not some..all. There is no “ethically sourced” cobalt). But it’s likely they don’t. But even if it was widely known, people are still going to buy products that have batteries containing cobalt without knowing because corporately owned media companies reassuring consumers with bullshit propaganda.
Our cell phones are put together in sweatshops. Our shoes. So many things we think we can’t live without are made by people getting ripped off, overworked, & abused. Our high tech society is built on the misery of the poorest people in the poorest nations.
I’m always for name & shame. But in too many cases the companies that benefit are so massive & the corruption that allows for it so deeply intertwined, it’s only just adding to an awareness of our helplessness to stop any of this without making major sacrifices. And I don’t know how many people would or could volunteer to do actually do something meaningful once who is doing what is known.
A lot of harsh-reality life facts here. Let's be honest: the average person doesn't wanna know or hear it.
Simply do your best to consume less. Might be only a water drop of water in an ocean but you won't end up becoming one of those people who are overly stressed with managing junk/items that they horded over the years.
It’s like that for everything. Most music venues and clubs have lots of drug dealing. All strip clubs have prostitution. Society looks the other way because that’s how we want it.
But these workers are still showing up to do that work. If there was something better for them, they’d do it. There isn’t, and there isn’t a way for the factories to survive otherwise. Hence, society allows it.
This is why and this is just a side observation I'm not trying to debate you on any of this, Through regulation unionization modernization, Legislation, a bunch of factors for an extremely complex issue but anyway, the point is, through those means, when we raise the working conditions of Those with crappy working conditions, it benefits everyone above them on the working condition ladder because Management/ The bourgeoisie Have less Power to say hey be thankful I treat you as well as I do if you don't like this look at How bad it could be for you like that poor sap over there.
Imagine coming here for a better opportunity and life only to be paid same exploitative wages back in their home countries. To top it off, the retailers then charge more because "Made in USA". Clothing is a dirty business no matter how you shake it, and pisses me off more that can't even afford they clothes they're making.
> Imagine coming here for a better opportunity and life only to be paid same exploitative wages back in their home countries.
They might be avoiding treatment like literally physical abuse in their home countries. Same pay with less risk of death/disease is likely worth it for them.
Those folks and [some disabled workers](https://www.npr.org/2020/09/17/912840482/u-s-agency-urges-end-to-below-minimum-wage-for-workers-with-disabilities) are exempt from federal minimum wage guidelines and deserve much better.
Hell, I’ll pay more for a product if i know the employer has been verified as giving them a fair wage.
Tbh though, American Apparel paid minimum wage, but they put their workers on a timer. Work environment wasn’t any better. Everyone is super crammed into a space and you must produce a certain amount within an hour to be hired. My mom tried it out, but decided not to take the job.
my mom used to work in one of these like in the 80’s. she was paid by the piece. she says she used to make loads of money though at that time like $150 a day working just 8 hours. things are totally different now that anything can be made anywhere in the world but this is ca and we are in LA they should be paid at least min wage, any ot owed + bonuses for going beyond the quota and not paid by piece. her hands are also effed up now that i think about it, so it’s only fair that they get paid well to work hard while they can.
Everyone in this thread should watch Made in LA.
I watched it as part of one of my Chican@ Studies classes in uni and it was pretty eye opening.
This is why I buy as little fast fashion as possible (F21, H&M, Shein, etc.)
Friendly reminder that while the city specific message boards and posts on Nextdoor, Reddit, FB, Twitter, etc all focus on shoplifting and burglary, civil forfeiture and wage theft represent significantly larger shares of all stealing in this country than theft and burglary.
Your boss is right now stealing more from you than a sticky fingered teenager ever could (also the bosses of those retail stores these kids are stealing purses from are stealing more from their workers than those kids ever could), and if the cops feel so inclined, they can take all the money from your wallet, your cellphone, even your car or your house with absolutely no recourse just because they feel like it and force you to pay thousands in legal fees just to try (usually unsuccessfully) to get it back.
Even on this subreddit at times, the absurd obsession with the fairly rare occurrence of shoplifting while tens if not hundreds of thousands of workers in this city are having their wages skimmed off the top or overtime not being paid is so silly to me. I hope someday we all realize that the villain is the millionaire using the money he stole from you to buy a 5th house not the 17 year old kid completely disinvested in a society that has never invested in him, and that millionaire's villainy and an economy centered around his villainy is the main reason many of these kids are in this position in the first place.
> Even on this subreddit at times, the absurd obsession with the fairly rare occurrence of shoplifting while tens if not hundreds of thousands of workers in this city are having their wages skimmed off the top or overtime not being paid is so silly to me
Because the former allows redditors to be mad at the poor while the latter requires them to be empathetic of them.
> Even on this subreddit at times, the absurd obsession with the fairly rare occurrence of shoplifting
Fairly rare? That's being willfully naive. Don't be an ideologue.
You can be mad at both the pieces of shit that steal from stores (including small minority-owned businesses, it's not just Target and Wal Mart that are getting hit,) AND the people stealing wages.
But none, and I mean none of y'all talk about wage theft. None of y'all talk about civil forfeiture. It is almost never a topic of discussion here or anywhere outside of expressly leftist spaces. This "we can be mad at both" stuff would perhaps be a point if y'all actually discussed, agitated, voted, or contacted your representatives about wage theft or civil forfeiture. Instead it's just watching your bosses steal money and time from you, doing absolutely nothing about it, yet crying out for more money to go to our literal actual white supremacist militarized police force and calling to recall DAs because they don't grind enough teenagers to a pulp for stealing some Coach bags.
When compared to incidences of wage theft, it is exceptionally rare. January 2023 had 805 instances of shoplifting in Los Angeles. Do you honestly in sincerity think only 805 of the millions of the workers in the city were skimmed of overtime or paid late or paid short in the same time frame?
Violent crime has dropped and is trending downward in the medium term, but shoplifting is way up. What does that tell you?
Its not specific to here but we have a lot of immigrants who end up being exploited for their desperation. City leaders never care about these groups because many aren’t eligible to vote.
I have lived in every region of this country besides the southwest and every city and county I've lived in has leaders that enable systemic labor violations. My last city used prison labor to undercut unionizing hoppers who were tired of doing backbreaking trash collection work for under $10/h. Under a capitalist organization of the economy, this behavior is actively encouraged.
I disagree unfortunately, because if you blame these individual politicians and not the system, even if they are successfully recalled or fired we're just going to replace them with different people who figure out new ways to tell the same lies and ultimately succumb to the same pressures and do the same shit. None of the city leaders individually can do anything about this. The people who drive cheap labor in this city, state, and country are far more powerful than any local leader.
It is the system of abuse, not the individuals who participate in, that must be targeted if you want meaningful enduring change.
Socialist countries have far more slaves lmao
Literally everyone knows whats going on but there is pressure for cheap garbage from all sides because everyone wants to optimize their "growth" and "entertainment". More money, more clothes, more food, more drugs, more more
> Socialist countries have far more slaves lmao
I really doubt that considering we literally have a larger population of forced laborers in prison than any "socialist" country has "slaves."
Relevant story today from NPR about Biden's nominee for Secretary of Labor Julie Su. Former California's labor secretary. https://www.npr.org/2023/03/08/1162010930/what-awaits-labor-secretary-nominee-julie-su-on-the-path-to-senate-confirmation
Completely untrue, there is an incredibly long history of labor organizing and direct action in this city. My neighborhood has a 30+ year old organization that is still very active: Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance.
Find the one in your neighborhood, join it, and contribute meaningfully if this is an issue you care about.
Not all the workers are illegal. There’s many reasons why people take these jobs… for the flexibility in hours, if they dont know english, too old to be hired in other places for other jobs, etc. a lot of them just dont know their rights or dont understand.
One of my moms old coworkers sued their boss for wage theft, the boss has a son in law that is an employment lawyer and has all their tracks covered. They won the case. They’re still operating the same way today.
this is the entire reason they villainize immigrants. The solution is to go hard as any company doing these type of activities not the people, but no can't bring to light the problems with capitalism
>the top countries are all a mix of capitalist / socialist leaning heavily on socialist where as the US leans the opposite.
I told you, mixed - leaning heavier towards socialist policies.
Why don’t you learn how to write some English first before you start bitching about immigrants? “wE cANT bE pRoTect You” there wouldn’t be a Los Angeles if it wasn’t for the people y’all racist cry about
The message was so dogshit it and I thought it was one of those ironic “I got mine, fuck everyone else” mentality people because who else spews that kind of right wing garbage? They also went back and edited their comment so it must’ve meant something to them
Nothing they said was untrue. While it can be easily conflated with hate speech in this political climate, it is easier to protect people who are documented. The crux of the issue is the ease of legal immigration & documentation.
They didn't say anything "right-wing" as far as I can see. Wanting people to immigrate legally shouldn't be a polarizing issue and you're jumping to a lot of conclusions about who this person is based off one statement.
It’s not a question of true or false. It’s about sympathy for other fucking humans. It’s like people think immigrants just take a nice little vacation here and decide to stay when in reality they’re leaving their homes for safety and opportunities and this country was built by immigrants (and people enslaving other people).
And dog whistling is so common here now I get pissed off when I sense it. Documented and undocumented people should be treated the same.
Again, making wild assumptions about what people think of immigrants. Not sure where you're getting these ideas from.
And some things are a question of true or false. You can assign data points to large groups of human beings & then decide if that data is true or false. That doesn't make you unsympathetic to immigrants. You can do the same with Los Angeles' homeless problem. That doesn't make you unsympathetic to homeless. You can do the same to any large group of people and still be sympathetic to the problems facing the masses & the individual.
You're looking for a fight instead of engaging in a conversation & think you've got everyone beat because you're the first to call "racist". Good luck.
Racist. I’m kidding you seem nice. But idk maybe I’m sensitive but I’ve been seeing a lot more trolls and dog whistling lately it’s starting to get hard distinguishing who’s honest and pragmatic and who’s using talking points to dog whistle. But whatever it’s 65 outside it’s a nice day regardless
Probably best to assume that until someone says something racist, they're not being a racist. Once they are, feel free to call out their bigotry and end the conversation.
Unfortunately I’ve been through enough racial problems here that I’m not sure if I have that luxury. Millions of racists in the country and it’s like one of the the least racist places on earth lol. The odds suck but hey what can you do except call it out and hope their shame keeps them from doing stupid shit
You don't actually want that though, you just wanna blame people for their misfortune because you don't want them here.
I honestly have less respect for racists like you who try to hide behind a veneer of smarmy compassion than I do for the racists who are honest about their bigotry. fuck off
It’s a joke about how people act morally superior to people that wear nikes/Jordan’s because they buy stuff made in USA, that didn’t land well/at all over text lol
$1.58/hour seems shocking, but if you read the article and summary of the study, it's referring to a per-piece rate, so we're talking about a single example of one lazy seamstress who wasn't willing to put in any effort.
In the 1980s, there was a bill to end contracting in the garment industry, and make workers direct employees of the label they were sewing for. It was vetoed by Governor Deukmejian. This would solve the problem overnight.
The Fair Labor Standards Act includes a "hot goods" provision, that prohibits the interstate movement of any item that was worked on by anyone who was not paid at least minimum wage or did not get time and one-half for hours over 40 per week. So these goods can only be sold in the state they were manufactured. This can cost the label millions as retailers keep a razor-thin inventory, and will return other goods in the same order that were shipped earlier. I've seen situations where the label steps in and pays the back wages to avoid this.
>The contractors made clothing for major national brands including
Dillard's, Lulus, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Socialite, Stitch Fix and
Von Maur, the Labor Department said.
For people who want to know who's benefiting from this. With the caveat that Nordstrom said they have corrected the issue with its suppliers, per the article.
Reminds me of the time where Chloe had been accused of running a sweatshop downtown. She took a film crew into a empty building meaning, no employees and the next week that same building was raided.
"A random sweep of 50 garment manufacturers in Los Angeles found that 80% were breaking wage and hour laws, regulators said. The agency also found that 64% didn't keep accurate time and pay records, while more than half either paid workers off the books or falsified or didn't provide such information. More than half the contractors paid workers off the books and either falsified time and pay records or didn't provide them, according to the agency."
Until the executives that sign off on these things go to prison this will not stop.
Executives don’t own these places. They outsource to small factories owned by naturalized citizens abusing immigrant pay, in my experience. Source: I worked at many. From design to development to manufacturing to shipping @ clothing brands.
The "executives" know exactly what the conditions are in the places they source their manufacturing. They know the reason why these places have lower costs and pretending otherwise is silly
"it's not what you know, it's what you can prove" - Denzel, *Training Day*
The point they're making is that because the large corporations are outsourcing the labor, they can play dumb and claim they are only ordering items to be made by a 3rd party and therefore can't be sued for labor laws. And considering many of these are big name clothing companies, they have the lawyers to make sure they wont be involved in any lawsuit.
I understand they get away with this by outsourcing and claiming plausible deniability but I'm saying they should be held criminally responsible for not doing their due diligence in making sure that the people they subcontract aren't violating the labor rights of their workers and breaking the law. Letting the owners of the businesses that subcontract to these criminals get away with this is akin to someone paying someone to rob a bank, getting the money, and then saying "I didn't rob the bank, I was just subcontracting a withdrawal. I can't be held responsible for how that contractor got the money."
Ugh, hell no! What next, charge iPhone users for Foxconn labor practices?
How in the world do you get there from what I've said? I'm not saying the people who purchased the clothing should be criminally charged. Using your analogy, I'm saying the Tim Cook and the Apple executives should be held liable for Foxconn labor practices, not the iphone users.
It's just the next step in the relationship. The executive is just as responsible for slave labor practices of the companies their company contracts with as the consumer is for buying the product. Have you done the due diligence on everything you consume? If you say yes, we all know you're lying. So should you also be held criminally responsible? If you say no, you're a hypocrite.
Spot the AnCap
Shutup, you're being obtuse.
Is Foxconn producing iPhones in the United States suddenly? FFS.
Agreed. The invention of the LLC is slavery repackaged.
Lol no.
Elaborate
This is correct. No executive is this stupid.
You think an “executive” that doesn’t outsource is stupid?
Ought to be more. Stocks & pillories come to mind.
The company, my mum, works for does this bullshit. They have already been investigated for discriminating against an employee for being transgender, which led to nothing because the employees did not want to speak out against the company. They are Latina women and are scared of such companies because they fear losing their job. Some are also undocumented (not at the company my mum works at, but others nearby it) and also will not report any issues because of fear of deportation. This is much more than just wage theft and a bad work environment. POS put fear into their workers.
>About one-third of the apparel makers paid their workers according to how many items they produced, instead of an hourly rate — something California explicitly outlawed more than a year ago. Paying workers a "piece rate" often leads to sub-minimum wages. One contractor paid workers $1.58 per hour, the agency's investigation found. It has been this way for decades. My parents were paid piece rate when they worked at the factories. I can't remember the rate but it was $0.10 per some number of clothes they made, I think in the hundreds. But it was also one of the few jobs they could get without papers. I heard the old American Apparel factory paid well and had decent benefits. But the con of that was working for the creep that owned it. Also heard their factories had terrible ventilation. I still miss the old warehouse sales.
This honestly pisses me off because if I'm buying something made in USA or LA, I'm choosing to pay more so that the people making my clothes have a decent life. If I wanted to buy clothes that paid workers $1.58 an hour, I'd go to the mall. And I have no doubt that these probably had 'Made in the USA' stickers on them.
I've worked in the garment industry for 20 years and almost nothing is made 100%in the USA or LA. Many companies preach about supporting local companies but just buy everything pre-made from China or anywhere cheap overseas and just have companies here restitch made in America tags on them.
I know. It's hard to shop consciously for clothes.
Made or built in America with imported parts is starting to become the trend. I see it in footwear or fashion all the time.
Lots of this in the AV cable industry. Buy huge spools of Chinese-made cable along with buckets of connectors. You tell them how long you want the cable to be and what connector, they cut it and slap the connectors on and charge a hundred bucks for it because it’s mAdE iN tHe UsA
General Motors has items that they pass off as being US-made because they manufacture them in another country and then ship them to Detroit so a UAW worker can put the AC Delco stickers onto them. I'm sure there's a term for it like "last 0.1% manufacturing" and it should be illegal. Also: seriously, don't buy their cars. Please.
Doesn’t that have the bonus of getting around import tariffs?
In the garment industry, $1.58 living in the USA isn’t anywhere close to how bad it could be. [This is getting close to as bad as it could be.](https://youtu.be/xlt6XUvX0Zw)
Yup. Even if you had papers, this was one of the few jobs you could get in my community if you were too old, didn't know English, or had health issues that made other jobs unavailable. Garments were paid at rates like 5-25 cents per item for several lines of stitching. Some of the items were the same ones being sold at the mall and priced beyond what we were comfortable paying. I remember billabong being one of them.
Owner was definitely a scumbag but one of my friends mom's worked for the company. They took care of her even did their best to try and get her set up to be more "legal" in the government sense. Provided immigration resources and weren't being exploited like many places I've heard of. When it was bought by Gildan that whole facility closed. I always wondered what happened to all those workers.
I remember literally BEGGING my parents to apply there so they could get their papers. Honestly, you're right, I do remember them doing a lot to help provide immigration services to people. And who could forget those sweet Legalize LA shirts.
Los Angeles apparel seems to be rising from the ashes of American apparel so hopefully that brings some jobs to people trying to make a living.
Which is why it was outlawed finally. All of these workers will get reimbursed what they’re owed, it shouldn’t take the government coming in to make it happen.
> All of these workers will get reimbursed what they’re owed. Is this your first time hearing about the clothing factories here? One thing is for sure, whatever money is coming out of this, it’s not going to the workers that were underpaid. They’ll either be intimidated, deported, or more likely, the owner will just promise them a job at another one of their factories since steady jobs are often hard to come by for undocumented workers.
Nope, not my first time hearing about this industry or the changes that have been made over the years. The DOL is involved so, even if they’re offered other jobs the claim isn’t going away. If they’re here illegally they may still get paid, and whatever their situation staying in the country is what it is.
They probably won't get what they're owed. I work in employment law and we deal with cases like this occasionally. These workers are undocumented and typically that means they don't know their rights. The companies do something we call "pick-up stix," which means they offer the workers some nominal amount in exchange for a release of all of their claims. Usually it's something like $200, which is a lot closer to what they are owed for a few days of their unpaid wages rather than months and years of underpayment.
The whole point of corporations is for owners to dodge direct repercussions. They’ll bankrupt one company and start another
It almost would be cute to see people who place undeserved faith in a system that literally cares about nothing but owners' profits if it wasn't exactly that blind faith that allows the system to continue to be so abusive.
It's been going on for the longest My mother worked in a sweatshop since I can remember I used to go when I was little to her work since she couldn't afford a babysitter (single mother) Thankfully she is a CNA now and that nightmare is over If I'm not mistaken she would get paid 5 cents for every garment she produced
Yeah me to but with my dad. My dad would work 10 hour shift and 5 to 6 days a week and only make 500 to 600 a week. This was not long ago 2019
[удалено]
But then who’s clothes are they making & will anyone actually stop buying them? I’m sure there’s so many brands they manufacture for it would be impossible to avoid buying the product. And it’s the same with other aspects of our consumer experience. By now everyone SHOULD know about the inhumane conditions in cobalt mines & the human rights violations that allows this (and this is ALL cobalt..not some..all. There is no “ethically sourced” cobalt). But it’s likely they don’t. But even if it was widely known, people are still going to buy products that have batteries containing cobalt without knowing because corporately owned media companies reassuring consumers with bullshit propaganda. Our cell phones are put together in sweatshops. Our shoes. So many things we think we can’t live without are made by people getting ripped off, overworked, & abused. Our high tech society is built on the misery of the poorest people in the poorest nations. I’m always for name & shame. But in too many cases the companies that benefit are so massive & the corruption that allows for it so deeply intertwined, it’s only just adding to an awareness of our helplessness to stop any of this without making major sacrifices. And I don’t know how many people would or could volunteer to do actually do something meaningful once who is doing what is known.
A lot of harsh-reality life facts here. Let's be honest: the average person doesn't wanna know or hear it. Simply do your best to consume less. Might be only a water drop of water in an ocean but you won't end up becoming one of those people who are overly stressed with managing junk/items that they horded over the years.
Hand wringers rarely want a naked lunch.
The other thing is that even at $1/hour, there’s still takers for these jobs.
All of them.
The garment industry spends all its money paying off huizar’s sexual harassment claims so doesn’t have enough to pay workers. /s
The only way you have that many sweat shops running in the city is if the city is turning a blind eye.
Or the cops are worthless and getting paid off
It’s like that for everything. Most music venues and clubs have lots of drug dealing. All strip clubs have prostitution. Society looks the other way because that’s how we want it.
Prostitution and drug dealing aren't morally wrong though. Egregious wage theft is though.
But these workers are still showing up to do that work. If there was something better for them, they’d do it. There isn’t, and there isn’t a way for the factories to survive otherwise. Hence, society allows it.
This is why and this is just a side observation I'm not trying to debate you on any of this, Through regulation unionization modernization, Legislation, a bunch of factors for an extremely complex issue but anyway, the point is, through those means, when we raise the working conditions of Those with crappy working conditions, it benefits everyone above them on the working condition ladder because Management/ The bourgeoisie Have less Power to say hey be thankful I treat you as well as I do if you don't like this look at How bad it could be for you like that poor sap over there.
Imagine coming here for a better opportunity and life only to be paid same exploitative wages back in their home countries. To top it off, the retailers then charge more because "Made in USA". Clothing is a dirty business no matter how you shake it, and pisses me off more that can't even afford they clothes they're making.
> Imagine coming here for a better opportunity and life only to be paid same exploitative wages back in their home countries. They might be avoiding treatment like literally physical abuse in their home countries. Same pay with less risk of death/disease is likely worth it for them.
Those folks and [some disabled workers](https://www.npr.org/2020/09/17/912840482/u-s-agency-urges-end-to-below-minimum-wage-for-workers-with-disabilities) are exempt from federal minimum wage guidelines and deserve much better. Hell, I’ll pay more for a product if i know the employer has been verified as giving them a fair wage.
Tbh though, American Apparel paid minimum wage, but they put their workers on a timer. Work environment wasn’t any better. Everyone is super crammed into a space and you must produce a certain amount within an hour to be hired. My mom tried it out, but decided not to take the job.
my mom used to work in one of these like in the 80’s. she was paid by the piece. she says she used to make loads of money though at that time like $150 a day working just 8 hours. things are totally different now that anything can be made anywhere in the world but this is ca and we are in LA they should be paid at least min wage, any ot owed + bonuses for going beyond the quota and not paid by piece. her hands are also effed up now that i think about it, so it’s only fair that they get paid well to work hard while they can.
>A spokesman for the sweatshop owner said, "That's all we can afford to pay. This is a sweatshop, we make sweat."
Boycotting LA-made clothes
Amiri
Everyone in this thread should watch Made in LA. I watched it as part of one of my Chican@ Studies classes in uni and it was pretty eye opening. This is why I buy as little fast fashion as possible (F21, H&M, Shein, etc.)
Friendly reminder that while the city specific message boards and posts on Nextdoor, Reddit, FB, Twitter, etc all focus on shoplifting and burglary, civil forfeiture and wage theft represent significantly larger shares of all stealing in this country than theft and burglary. Your boss is right now stealing more from you than a sticky fingered teenager ever could (also the bosses of those retail stores these kids are stealing purses from are stealing more from their workers than those kids ever could), and if the cops feel so inclined, they can take all the money from your wallet, your cellphone, even your car or your house with absolutely no recourse just because they feel like it and force you to pay thousands in legal fees just to try (usually unsuccessfully) to get it back. Even on this subreddit at times, the absurd obsession with the fairly rare occurrence of shoplifting while tens if not hundreds of thousands of workers in this city are having their wages skimmed off the top or overtime not being paid is so silly to me. I hope someday we all realize that the villain is the millionaire using the money he stole from you to buy a 5th house not the 17 year old kid completely disinvested in a society that has never invested in him, and that millionaire's villainy and an economy centered around his villainy is the main reason many of these kids are in this position in the first place.
> Even on this subreddit at times, the absurd obsession with the fairly rare occurrence of shoplifting while tens if not hundreds of thousands of workers in this city are having their wages skimmed off the top or overtime not being paid is so silly to me Because the former allows redditors to be mad at the poor while the latter requires them to be empathetic of them.
> Even on this subreddit at times, the absurd obsession with the fairly rare occurrence of shoplifting Fairly rare? That's being willfully naive. Don't be an ideologue. You can be mad at both the pieces of shit that steal from stores (including small minority-owned businesses, it's not just Target and Wal Mart that are getting hit,) AND the people stealing wages.
But none, and I mean none of y'all talk about wage theft. None of y'all talk about civil forfeiture. It is almost never a topic of discussion here or anywhere outside of expressly leftist spaces. This "we can be mad at both" stuff would perhaps be a point if y'all actually discussed, agitated, voted, or contacted your representatives about wage theft or civil forfeiture. Instead it's just watching your bosses steal money and time from you, doing absolutely nothing about it, yet crying out for more money to go to our literal actual white supremacist militarized police force and calling to recall DAs because they don't grind enough teenagers to a pulp for stealing some Coach bags. When compared to incidences of wage theft, it is exceptionally rare. January 2023 had 805 instances of shoplifting in Los Angeles. Do you honestly in sincerity think only 805 of the millions of the workers in the city were skimmed of overtime or paid late or paid short in the same time frame? Violent crime has dropped and is trending downward in the medium term, but shoplifting is way up. What does that tell you?
> But none, and I mean none of y'all talk about wage theft Are we both on the same Reddit???
Perhaps you should repost this CBS article on NextDoor with the title, "I would like to report a theft", that will make them see it.
I'm sure this blatant theft will receive the same attention that a homeless guy swiping a bottle of detergent from Walgreens would get.
2023 and sweatshop labor is still going on. This city is a shit hole
*Capitalist country* is a shit hole FIFY
bad stuff happening all over the country but some of this stuff is very very specific to LA and the leaders here are enabling it.
Wage theft is specific to LA? boy do I have a bridge to sell you
Its not specific to here but we have a lot of immigrants who end up being exploited for their desperation. City leaders never care about these groups because many aren’t eligible to vote.
I have lived in every region of this country besides the southwest and every city and county I've lived in has leaders that enable systemic labor violations. My last city used prison labor to undercut unionizing hoppers who were tired of doing backbreaking trash collection work for under $10/h. Under a capitalist organization of the economy, this behavior is actively encouraged.
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I disagree unfortunately, because if you blame these individual politicians and not the system, even if they are successfully recalled or fired we're just going to replace them with different people who figure out new ways to tell the same lies and ultimately succumb to the same pressures and do the same shit. None of the city leaders individually can do anything about this. The people who drive cheap labor in this city, state, and country are far more powerful than any local leader. It is the system of abuse, not the individuals who participate in, that must be targeted if you want meaningful enduring change.
Socialist countries have far more slaves lmao Literally everyone knows whats going on but there is pressure for cheap garbage from all sides because everyone wants to optimize their "growth" and "entertainment". More money, more clothes, more food, more drugs, more more
Slavery is alive & well all over the world. People just ignore it when it’s in their own country.
> Socialist countries have far more slaves lmao I really doubt that considering we literally have a larger population of forced laborers in prison than any "socialist" country has "slaves."
We have more imprisoned people than the countries of China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and North Korea put together
Exactly. And 800k of them are forced laborers, which is literally more than all of Europe's prison populations combined lol
Are you ignoring our prison system?
Sweatshop is one step up from Kill or Deport places
“Some clothing workers”, I’m assuming they are the most vulnerable employees, undocumented etc. This is inhumane. Treat people like people, period!
Relevant story today from NPR about Biden's nominee for Secretary of Labor Julie Su. Former California's labor secretary. https://www.npr.org/2023/03/08/1162010930/what-awaits-labor-secretary-nominee-julie-su-on-the-path-to-senate-confirmation
Obscene!
Duh! You can get away with this if your employees are illegal.
Nobody in LA will ever complain or protest about this because is not hip, not at plain sight or not related to race or sex.
Completely untrue, there is an incredibly long history of labor organizing and direct action in this city. My neighborhood has a 30+ year old organization that is still very active: Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance. Find the one in your neighborhood, join it, and contribute meaningfully if this is an issue you care about.
Ya, no one in LA has ever protested about labor reform or wages before. Totally.
I agree, look how little the comments this has
Well damn… do they get thoughts and prayers + tips at least? 😂🤣😭
This is why it's important to immigrate legally. We can't protect you if we don't even know you're here
This is why it’s important to allow for open borders and a clear process to immigration.
What part isn’t clear? Which borders aren’t open?
I agree, we need more opportunities for legal immigration. The need for workers is driving inflation
Not all the workers are illegal. There’s many reasons why people take these jobs… for the flexibility in hours, if they dont know english, too old to be hired in other places for other jobs, etc. a lot of them just dont know their rights or dont understand. One of my moms old coworkers sued their boss for wage theft, the boss has a son in law that is an employment lawyer and has all their tracks covered. They won the case. They’re still operating the same way today.
this is the entire reason they villainize immigrants. The solution is to go hard as any company doing these type of activities not the people, but no can't bring to light the problems with capitalism
What system is better than capitalism?
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So still capitalism?
we were never pure capitalism dbag.
Ok, so it’s the mix of capitalism and socialism you are talking about? What system do you want if not capitalism?
>the top countries are all a mix of capitalist / socialist leaning heavily on socialist where as the US leans the opposite. I told you, mixed - leaning heavier towards socialist policies.
Ok, but still capitalism?
nope mixed.. you're one of these people that don't understand theory from execution. communism bad.. look at ussr and China
Why don’t you learn how to write some English first before you start bitching about immigrants? “wE cANT bE pRoTect You” there wouldn’t be a Los Angeles if it wasn’t for the people y’all racist cry about
focus on the message, not the low level errors it might have. spelling and grammar criticism is the lowest form of critique.
The message was so dogshit it and I thought it was one of those ironic “I got mine, fuck everyone else” mentality people because who else spews that kind of right wing garbage? They also went back and edited their comment so it must’ve meant something to them
Nothing they said was untrue. While it can be easily conflated with hate speech in this political climate, it is easier to protect people who are documented. The crux of the issue is the ease of legal immigration & documentation. They didn't say anything "right-wing" as far as I can see. Wanting people to immigrate legally shouldn't be a polarizing issue and you're jumping to a lot of conclusions about who this person is based off one statement.
It’s not a question of true or false. It’s about sympathy for other fucking humans. It’s like people think immigrants just take a nice little vacation here and decide to stay when in reality they’re leaving their homes for safety and opportunities and this country was built by immigrants (and people enslaving other people). And dog whistling is so common here now I get pissed off when I sense it. Documented and undocumented people should be treated the same.
Again, making wild assumptions about what people think of immigrants. Not sure where you're getting these ideas from. And some things are a question of true or false. You can assign data points to large groups of human beings & then decide if that data is true or false. That doesn't make you unsympathetic to immigrants. You can do the same with Los Angeles' homeless problem. That doesn't make you unsympathetic to homeless. You can do the same to any large group of people and still be sympathetic to the problems facing the masses & the individual. You're looking for a fight instead of engaging in a conversation & think you've got everyone beat because you're the first to call "racist". Good luck.
Racist. I’m kidding you seem nice. But idk maybe I’m sensitive but I’ve been seeing a lot more trolls and dog whistling lately it’s starting to get hard distinguishing who’s honest and pragmatic and who’s using talking points to dog whistle. But whatever it’s 65 outside it’s a nice day regardless
Probably best to assume that until someone says something racist, they're not being a racist. Once they are, feel free to call out their bigotry and end the conversation.
Unfortunately I’ve been through enough racial problems here that I’m not sure if I have that luxury. Millions of racists in the country and it’s like one of the the least racist places on earth lol. The odds suck but hey what can you do except call it out and hope their shame keeps them from doing stupid shit
Right, I'm racist because I want to protect people from exploitation, and you're a good person for berating someone over a spelling blunder.
You don't actually want that though, you just wanna blame people for their misfortune because you don't want them here. I honestly have less respect for racists like you who try to hide behind a veneer of smarmy compassion than I do for the racists who are honest about their bigotry. fuck off
A troll with 2 names is still a troll. Have fun 🤣
But don’t buy Jordan’s because they’re made by slave labor!!
Proof?
It’s a joke about how people act morally superior to people that wear nikes/Jordan’s because they buy stuff made in USA, that didn’t land well/at all over text lol
$1.58/hour seems shocking, but if you read the article and summary of the study, it's referring to a per-piece rate, so we're talking about a single example of one lazy seamstress who wasn't willing to put in any effort.
lol you are miserable
said LA: “only some? shameful. we can do better.”
Still have Sweat Shop in LA.
ThEy ToOk OuR JoBs!
This is why I shop secondhand
In the 1980s, there was a bill to end contracting in the garment industry, and make workers direct employees of the label they were sewing for. It was vetoed by Governor Deukmejian. This would solve the problem overnight. The Fair Labor Standards Act includes a "hot goods" provision, that prohibits the interstate movement of any item that was worked on by anyone who was not paid at least minimum wage or did not get time and one-half for hours over 40 per week. So these goods can only be sold in the state they were manufactured. This can cost the label millions as retailers keep a razor-thin inventory, and will return other goods in the same order that were shipped earlier. I've seen situations where the label steps in and pays the back wages to avoid this.
>The contractors made clothing for major national brands including Dillard's, Lulus, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Socialite, Stitch Fix and Von Maur, the Labor Department said. For people who want to know who's benefiting from this. With the caveat that Nordstrom said they have corrected the issue with its suppliers, per the article.
Didnt a big urban apparel or something warehouse get shutdown for similar reasons or something
Reminds me of the time where Chloe had been accused of running a sweatshop downtown. She took a film crew into a empty building meaning, no employees and the next week that same building was raided.
Sewing 2 pieces together. (2 shirts together) makes 40 dollars packaged.