STARTS
Fleeing the factory
The shift from product marketing to brand marketing has relegated manufacturing to a subordinate role in contemporary capitalism. By contracting out production to nameless producers kept on a tight leash, the megabrand innovators saved money that could be plowed back into marketing the brand. “Traveling light” came into vogue, that is, shedding your own factories, cutting your workforce, and passing the dirty task of production to fly-by-night Taiwanese or Korean operators moving from one Asian export processing zone to another.
Some of the book’s most poignant pages describe the lives of globalization’s laborers: nonunion, horribly underpaid, permanently “temporary” female workers in the export processing zone of Rosario, Cavite, in the Philippines. Here the illusion of the benefits of foreign investment for developing countries is dashed to pieces by the reality of young lives wasting away in factories that are more like prisons; of wages so low that most of the workers’ pay is spent on shared dorm rooms, transportation, and basic sustenance; of government officials so scared of investors leaving for Vietnam or China that they offer the footloose subcontractors all sorts of tax breaks and dare not allow unionism.
Again, Nike led the way. Shedding its factories in the North, Nike?transferred its production to sub-contractors, who proceeded to do the dirty work of squeezing wages, institutionalizing forced overtime, and preventing union organizing. For the same subcontractor to churn out Nike sneakers along with Adidas and Reebok sneakers was not unusual. When confronted with accusations of exploiting labor, Nike, Adidas, and Reebok would wash their hands of responsibility, saying that these are matters to be resolved between the subcontractor and the workers.
What goes around comes around. What Nike and the other megabrands did to workers in the South, they also did to the young workers selling their products in the North: they eliminated permanent employment, did away with benefits, and paid them minimum wage. Many functions that were once performed in house by permanent employees have now been contracted out wholesale to temp agencies, which, Klein says, “have become full service human resource departments for all your no-commitment staffing needs.”
The new mantra for the street-smart CEO comes from Tom Peters: “You’re a damn fool if you own it.” And the apotheosis of the age is the CEO for hire, like “Chainsaw” Al Dunlap. Paid millions in salary and stock options to put a corporation back in the black, his first act in office is usually slashing the workforce.
ENDS
CLICK HERE And please note the request on the web page to purchase from an independent bookseller. Even better, ask your local store to get it for you.
A slightly different analysis of the book cab be found HERE
And finally, a graphic lifted from ADBUSTERS that is in context with the book's theme and which really appeals to my sense of humour...baa..aaa..aaaaaa
