Catherwood LibraryILR School

After a rash of suicides at their factories this year, electronics producer Foxconn announced that it was raising wages at their Chinese factories from $132 to $176 per month, a 33% increase. The company denied that the raise was due to the suicides, citing instead inflation and the attraction higher wages would hold for higher skilled employees. Foxconn employs over 800,000 Chinese workers, and like many other companies has faced labor shortages. A strike at a Honda plant was resolved with a 24% pay raise, another sign of the pressure on companies and cities to raise wages to cope with inflation. Foxconn has also faced allegations of workers' rights violations, and Apple, Dell and H.P. have all said that they are concerned by both the suicides and the allegations, and expected Foxconn to meet labor standards. A labor rights activist in Hong Kong said that the wages were not enough to truly negate the effects of inflation, and did nothing to address workers' rights concerns.