Everyone loves his or her new set of Nike apparel. In fact, Nike can be found on the bodies of many athletic team members. Why would such a prosperous and well-known company rely on the exploitation of child slave labor? It all started when CEO Philip Knight came up with a "brilliant idea": put shoe factories in Asia, paying the workers pennies on the dollar, and raking in immense profits. Nike can easily afford to pay workers a fair amount. One can see that this is the antithesis of Nike's philosophy: doing what's fair. Workers in Nike sweatshops are denied human rights, pressured into working long and hard hours, and worst of all can't provide for themselves or their families. It's ironic how an American company, which enjoys the rights given to it by the American government, takes away human rights in other countries.
Nike should open its factories to inspection by the local labor rights offices. Until it wants to, Nike will probably continue the denial of human rights. Workers in one factory in Formosa, El Salvador are abused frequently and take it because they need the money. They take physical and verbal abuse such as yelling, cursing, and even hitting and shoving. Bathroom visits are monitored and limited. The workers have never even heard of the Nike Code of Conduct. Workers could be fired on the spot if they were suspected to be involved with joining a union or a strike. Pregnancy tests are even given to new workers. If they are found to be positive, they are fired immediately. Nike should educate its workers so they know their legal rights. Nike should not just move its sweatshops out of complaining countries, as this could hurt the country's economy.
Long and hard hours are notorious of the Nike sweatshops. Nike workers are forced to work overtime without pay. Sick days and visits to the clinic are denied or deducted from the worker's wages. Workers in the PT Hardaya Aneka factory went on strike, demanding that they be paid the new minimum wage of Indonesia ($2.26 - $2.46). However, the Indonesian government allows garment and shoe manufacturers with large work forces to ask for permission to delay paying the new minimum wage if a public audit proves they are incapable of doing so. Reluctantly, Nike accepted to pay but stated that it would not increase its wages due to more increased minimum wages in Indonesia.
Large corporations such as Nike, Gap, and Reebok and many others from the United States have moved their factories to undeveloped nations; barely pay their employees enough to live on. Countries such as China, Indonesia, and Haiti have readily abundant cheap labor. There should be labor laws or an obligation of respecting workers to provide decent working conditions, fair wages, and safety standards.
interpret this the wrong way. I love my country and I do not blame the
Unlike Hobby Lobby, which has its policies and mission rooted in Christian ideals, the apparel giant Nike, Inc. serves as an example that change is possible. The company suffered tremendous backlash in 1991 when an activist published about the poor working conditions in some of the textile factories for Nike overseas, specifically in Indonesia. While Nike did provide some formal response, the following year in 1992, the same activist publishes “The New Free-Trade Heel: Nike’s Profits Jump on the Backs of Asian Workers,” (Ballinger). Further controversy arose as protestors spoke out against Nike at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, urging the boycott of Nike products. Amidst some efforts for Nike to investigate the claims, the company faces further backlash, forcing layoffs due to weakened sales by 1998. In 1999, former President Bill Clinton established a task force that evolved into the Fair Labor Association (FLA), amid the Nike sweatshop rumors, as well as other companies. FLA is responsible for protecting workers’ rights through transparent audits. As a participating member, Nike performed factory audits between the
Sweatshops are factories that violate two or more human rights. Sweatshops are known in the media and politically as dangerous places for workers to work in and are infamous for paying minimum wages for long hours of labour. The first source is a quote that states that Nike has helped improve Vietnamese’s’ workers lives by helping them be able to afford luxuries they did not have access to before such as scooters, bicycles and even cars. The source is showing sweatshops in a positive light stating how before sweatshops were established in developing countries, Vietnamese citizens were very poor and underprivileged. The source continues to say that the moment when sweatshops came to Vietnam, workers started to get more profit and their lives eventually went uphill from their due to being able to afford more necessities and luxuries; one of them being a vehicle, which makes their commute to work much faster which in turn increases their quality of life. The source demonstrates this point by mentioning that this is all due to globalization. Because of globalization, multinationals are able to make investments in developing countries which in turn offers the sweatshops and the employees better technology, better working skills and an improvement in their education which overall helps raise the sweatshops’ productivity which results in an increase
Corporations in the United States have proved time and time again that they are all about profit and not about what is good for America. One example of this is the fact that many corporations have factories in other countries, or buy from other corporations that do. Nike (an athletic shoe and clothing company) produces most of their shoes and apparel in factories in other countries, including Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, China, Vietnam and Malaysia. According to Nike’s factory disclosure list released May 2011, only 49 of it’s over 700 factories are located in the U.S. (Nike, Inc.) This means that thousands of jobs that could be filled by needy Americans are instead being filled by workers in other countries. This reason that Nike and other corporations outsource is very simple, it is very cheap to do so. In an excerpt from Jeffrey St. Clair's book “Born Under a Bad Sky” the author describes the vast differences between Nike’s production costs and retail prices. “In Vietnam, it costs Nike only $1.50 to manufactu...
Nike’s sweatshop manufacturing practices which can be seen through media have shown people that this company goes under the good guys images, these images which are displayed in their commercials show people that their employees are treated well and their happy in their working environment.
...rible situations for people who do not have the laws like U.S. workers have. Even though NIKE has implemented different methods to improve the companies’ image, there have still been many reports that show there has not been much change at all. At a net worth of 67 billion dollars and expected to grow, loyal customers is what allows this multi billion dollar company to grow in profit, the only way there will be an impact on those working in NIKE sweatshops is if today’s society takes action.
Nike has always been a company that's been questioned ethically. People have heard about the stories of the sweatshops in Southeast Asia exploiting adolescent employees for unreasonably small amounts of money. This had blemished Nike’s reputation several years ago, but since then, it has strived to become a truly respectable company. Located on Nike's website you can find Phil Knight's credo about ethics. It is as follows:
Nike does not merely sell products these days. They spend billions of dollars for advertising contracts with famous athletes like Tiger Woods to increase the value of the brand by associating the factor of lifestyle to their products. The company's image has been damaged many times by press releases as well as a variety of NGOs who have long pointed out the inhumane working conditions in the production facilities of sporting goods manufacturers. This leads to the question whether should Nike orientate the regulations of the suppliers to the labor standards in their respective countries or those in the United States? The labor conditions are so inhumane that Nike at least should try to converse to the US standard to improve the situation. The following analysis of an abstract of Nikes’ Responsibility Concept, including SHAPE and their Code of Conduct, should give an insight into the difficulties of the Sweatshops.
Phil Knight started his shoe company by selling shoes from the back of his car. As he became more successful in 1972 he branded the name Nike. In the 1980’s Nike Corporation quickly grew and established itself as a world leader in manufacturing and distributing athletic footwear and sports' attire. The Nike manufacturing model has followed is to outsource its manufacturing to developing nations in the Asia Pacific, Africa, South and Latin Americas; where labor is inexpensive. It quickly became known for its iconic “swoosh” and “Just do it” advertisements and products. Its highly successful advertising campaigns and brand developed its strong market share and consumer base. But, the road has not always been easy for Nike; in the late 1990’s they went through some challenging times when their brand become synonymous with slave wages and child labor abuses. During this period, Nike learned that it paramount that the company understands its stakeholders’ opinions and ensures their values are congruent with their stakeholders. Nike learned that their stakeholders were concerned with more than buying low cost products; their customers were also concerned with ethical and fair treatment of their workers. Because Nike was unwilling to face the ethical treatment of its employees, the company lost its loyal customers and damaged its reputation. Nike has bounced back since the late 1990’s and revived its reputation by focusing on its internal shortfalls and attacking its issues head on. Nike nearly collapsed from its missteps in the late 1990’s. They have learned from their mistakes and taken steps to quickly identify ethical issues before they become a crisis through ethics audits. This paper is based on the case study of Nike: From Sweatsh...
Many people in our society today are constantly asking, "Why do sweatshops exist?" The answer to this question is that companies like Nike and Wal-Mart use sweatshops to produce their goods for a much cheaper rate, to reduce the cost of their products. The problem with sweatshops is that the workers are subject to hard work in often times poor conditions for minimal pay. But although many people may condemn sweatshops, there are some advantages that many people overlook when arguing against sweatshops and their practices.
However, Nike’s outsourcing brought on much criticism. Not only did they get criticized for the effects on the U.S. economy and loss of jobs but foremost, labor conditions in some of these overseas factories were questioned by anti-sweatshop activists claiming workers were being exploited and abused. Activists encouraged many college campuses to boycott Nike shoes and clothing and tried to pressure the athletic departments to not sign deals with Nike for team apparel.
The Ethical Issues The first ethical issue that is occurred in Nike Inc. is sweatshop labor. Sweatshop labor defined as a factory that violates 2 or more labor laws. These shop or factory abuse labor to work for long hours at low wages and under poor condition. Nike company has been accused of using sweatshops since the early 1990s.
With the increasing awareness and publicity of poor working conditions in subcontracted factories in East Asia, Nike has stimulated an uprising of activist and watchdog groups working toward seeing these conditions changed. With Nike in the negative spotlight, various organizations have revolved around generating a negative outlook on Nike’s practices of social irresponsibility. Certain campaigns such as the “National Days of Consciousness” and “International Day of Protest” were organized to educate people on the deplorable working conditions in Nike’s Asian manufacturing plants, and were designed to get more people involved in global employment issues.
In June of 1996, Life magazine published a article about Nike’s child labor that was occurring in Pakistan. The article showed a little boy who was surrounded by pieces of Nike sports gear. The articles were shoes and soccer balls. Nike then knew then that they had to make some major changes in the way they were producing their items.