Chinese Migrant Workers Say They Are Alienated
Chinese migrant construction laborers are overworked, feel isolated from urban society and mostly lack basic insurance, state media reported on Monday, citing a survey. The report comes after China's rubber-stamp parliament passed a labor law giving greater protection to workers' rights. It also follows a brick kiln slave labor scandal which prompted nationwide outrage. Some 53 percent of migrant workers lacked an official contract and only 17 percent of workers with contracts understood their content, the China Daily said, citing a poll of 5,000 workers in several major cities by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a government think-tank, and Beijing's Tsinghua University.
See "Chinese Migrant Workers Say They Are Alienated", Reuters, The New York Times, July 8, 2007