what do you expect him to start?

people will still buy apple products made by Chinese people

If we could help unionize China, American workers could make a come back.

@Chrisg, I have not. Thanks for writing here.

@3:

This is an issue that's being explored by a number of writers & thinkers besides Daisey (bless him! The story of him passing himself off as an American businessman - using home-made business cards no less - to the Chinese Foxconn Execs was priceless!), Cory Doctorow's novel "For The Win" and Harold Meyer's recent article in The Washington Post being just two recent examples.

And it's a BIG problem, because it's enabled the Chinese government to maintain artificially low manufacturing & therefore export costs, which in turn has resulted in a humongous trade imbalance. American workers CAN create superior products, but NOT at the prices the Chinese can leverage, what with their astronomically large workforce, and their turning a blind eye to the deplorable health and safety conditions that exist in these "super factories".

I once witnessed this man's meal in an Italian restaurant. It was shocking that he didn't eat the napkin for the smears of marinara.

The fact that he's worried about the health of the person who made my iPod instead of his own is just another reason I think professional theater-makers are woefully out of touch.

@COMTE It isn't fair to put all the blame on the Chinese. The foreign companies that demand these products rarely impose any labor standards on their products, and they do know what's going on. Often, there's no way that these factories can produce products at the low price and incredibly fast rate that the brand name companies demand without cutting corners. When the buyers do send in inspectors, they often don't speak Chinese (and even if they do, they might not speak the same language as the migrant workers) and don't do a very thorough job of investigation. When the PRC central government started drafting a labor law a few years ago, the US Chamber of Commerce sent a very pissy letter claiming that the imposition of the labor law would drive all foreign investment and manufacture away from China and into countries where they can continue to get away with their demands. I'm not saying that the Chinese government isn't at fault, but we need to realize that the companies that brand and sell the goods are also responsible. Not to mention those of us who purchase said goods.

awesome possum. i'll have to look into this guy and his work more, have heard of him many times over the years from the Stranger, haven't checked out his work yet

@8:

Agreed. It certainly wasn't my intention (nor is it Daisey's in the show) to imply the the multi-nationals operating in the Special Economic Zones aren't entirely complicit in the exploitation of these workers. But frankly, if it hadn't been for the PRC opening these up in the first place, a lot of these horrors wouldn't be happening there today.

(Although, human nature being what it is, I fully realize the corporatists would simply have shopped around until they found another desperate, impoverished country willing to turn a blind eye to letting their workforce be squeezed like a bloody sponge.)

perhaps not entirely relevant, but i've been to tanna, and they totally have money (as part of the independent nation of vanuatu, they use the vatu). they have money, satellite internet, a gas station that runs on a tiny little pump (and accepts checks), little stores, and a bustling tourist economy of bungalows and trips up the mt yusur volcano. we definitely paid a lot of money to buy powdered milk for a kid in the hospital, and the kid couldn't make it home to die because nobody could come up with the cash for fuel for the hospital truck.

they also have a giant sign in lenakel: "black man's town" -- only black people are allowed to own businesses.

i also worked with the grandson of one of the leaders of the cargo cult, and in the mid-80s, he abandoned the cult (john frum cargo cult) because he looked around and saw that all the prophecies -- money, clothing, economy -- had come true. the entire family is now baha'i.