Global Labor Problems

Average Wage in China:

Presuming a 40-hour work week and 50 weeks per year, that would come to about an average manufacturing wage of $3.50 per hour. ever, The average hourly wage in manufacturing in the U.S. is $19.50 per hour—five and a half times that of China.

Union Representation in China:

Except for the state-sponsored ACFTU, China's constitution outlaws labor unions for workers.

The country's main and only legal labor union is government controlled, workers are stuck putting pressure directly on their employers—which often results in bad PR for the PRC.

There is virtually no chance that the ACFTU is going to taper off or that the government is ever going to allow individual, unaffiliated trade unions on the mainland.

Overall Labor Conditions:

China has decreased due to increasing labor costs and declining capital investment, the closure of factories that employ many thousands of individuals has revealed a major deficiency in the Chinese market: the protection of the roughly 270 million migrant workers. These are farmers who travel long distance to urban areas when the growing season closes.

Chinese industry has a long-standing issue of non-payment, delayed, or partial payment of wages. The situation has worsened since the slowdown of the Chinese economy, and the levels of industrial dispute and protest has increased proportionately.