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Corporate Social Responsibility and Labor Issues

This document discusses corporate social responsibility and labor issues in the textile and apparel industries. It addresses topics like women workers, child labor, and sweatshops. Regarding labor issues, it notes the industry's need to keep costs low can enable abuses, and that similar issues occurred historically in now-developed countries. It provides details on the large percentage of women in the industry and how global changes affect them. It explains the historical use of child labor and lack of alternatives in some developing nations. Finally, it defines and discusses sweatshops, noting corporate greed and competition drive their existence through minimizing costs via low wages, long hours, and lack of standards.

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Dineshkumar Shanmugam
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46 views

Corporate Social Responsibility and Labor Issues

This document discusses corporate social responsibility and labor issues in the textile and apparel industries. It addresses topics like women workers, child labor, and sweatshops. Regarding labor issues, it notes the industry's need to keep costs low can enable abuses, and that similar issues occurred historically in now-developed countries. It provides details on the large percentage of women in the industry and how global changes affect them. It explains the historical use of child labor and lack of alternatives in some developing nations. Finally, it defines and discusses sweatshops, noting corporate greed and competition drive their existence through minimizing costs via low wages, long hours, and lack of standards.

Uploaded by

Dineshkumar Shanmugam
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Corporate Social Responsibility

and Labor issues

Topics for todays class


Corporate

Social Responsibility
Labor issues

Women workers
Child Labor
Sweatshops

Labor Issues

Women workers
Child Labor
Sweatshops

Labor Issues

Why are there labor issues?

Competition to keep costs down so abuses possible


Differing cultural factors that in combination can create
abuse

Could the industry have developed without the


abuses?
- Remember that in the US and England, when the industry
began there were also similar abuses - sweatshops, child
labor

Women Workers

Industries employ largely women in both developed


and developing world.

80-90% of global apparel workforce is female.


50% of textile workforce is female.

Global industry change affects women.

Developed nations: become unemployed


Developing nation: young women get jobs in export
processing zone with low wages, long hours, severe working
conditions or make their own operation through subcontracting.

Child Labors

Child labor were common practice during


industrialisation age.
Cheapest source of available labor is children.
In developing world, child labor is pretty common.
The countries do not have enough schools to
accommodate children.
Lack of alternative for child workers in poor
countries.
Sweatshops

Sweatshops

Defined by the U.S. General Accounting office as a


business that regularly violates both wages or child
labor and safety or health laws.
Corporate greed and global competition to produce
goods at the lowest possible price are the main
reasons for the existence of sweatshops.
It's much more cost-effective for corporations to
subcontract to suppliers who produce goods cheaply
by minimising worker salaries and benefits, skimping
on factory and dormitory upkeep and standards, and
demanding high levels of productivity (long hours
and big quotas) from their workers.

Question: Sweatshops
Q: Isn't the low-wage employment offered
by sweatshops better than not being
employed at all? Don't sweatshops help
poor people climb out of poverty?
A: No. Sweatshop workers and child laborers
are trapped in a cycle of exploitation that
rarely improves their economic situation.

Question: Sweatshops
Q: Should I boycott manufacturers that use
sweatshop labor, or should I pressure
companies to change?
A: You can do both. In general, boycotts are
most effective when organized by the
workers themselves.

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