Sweatshops

Workers Conditions in 19th Century Europe What would it be like to be forced to work long hours for little pay? What feelings would you have after being treated horribly at your workplace? Many workers had to face hardship while working in the factories of 19th century Europe. This was caused by careless government and factory owners. The workers had terrible lives because of low wages and inability to advance in social class.

However, physical and sexual abuse is another serious concern of many of the sweatshop workers. Most of the sweatshops run by Nike contractors are factories located in relatively small spaces to save on real estate costs. They are often soiled with dirt and kept unheated to save on expenses. Broken glass and dangerous equipment is left on the floors causing potential dangers to any people scattered within the factory. Employees are subject to harassment and violent punishments if work is not being completed as thoroughly and efficiently as the contractors would like.

Some arguments raised by the United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) are the poor working conditions, low wages, long hours, and children in the factories. The damp, dark, and cold environment can depress the workers even more than they may be, causing rates in suicide to increase. Low wages is another concern USAS have. The workers barley get enough money to survive.

This is how companies minimize their total costs and they seek for locations with the smallest wages and human rights protections (Background). Now lets take a look and see why sweatshop work is so horrendous. The way that sweatshops treat their workers is absolutely brutal. They force their workers to work all the way up to 60-80 hours per week and do not pay them nearly enough to even be able to provide food for their families. Sometimes the workers will only receive a few pennies for one whole day of work (Background).

On top of that, workers have no access to compensation for their injuries while working in sweatshops. Thes... ... middle of paper ... ..., the only solution is to fix the problem. We shouldn't just obliterate the problem, because problems can be fixed. In order to improve conditions within sweatshops, we must think about what the worker population wants. The conditions within these factories are brutal and abusive, as well as troubling.

Employees working in sweatshops can face long working hours with forced overtime, low wages, can be subjected to verbal or physical abuse, crowded rooms with poor ventilation, and unsafe buildings. Workers are usually coerced against or prevented from joining unions as well. A recent example of treatment of factory employees is the building collapse of a Bangladesh factory on April 24, 2013. Some of the items being produced in this factory were clothing for Benetton and The Children’s... ... middle of paper ... ...o jobs in the new service economy, and are having a difficult time finding work. And to make matters even worse, if they are able to find jobs in the service industry, they are usually lower paying than the jobs they lost in manufacturing (Hodson & Sullivan, 2012).

Industrializations negative effects were bad working conditions, long and strenuous hours, injury and even death took it role on the society during this time. First, during the industrial revolution, bad working conditions were almost for sure. So many people had been stuck with a dangerous job, and on top of that the way they worked was even worse. Even little kids had to work in these terrible conditions. Children were forced to work where adults had a hard time working, mostly things that were easier so that way it wasn’t too complicated to where they couldn’t do it or slowed production.

The working class faced conditions in the factory that wealthier skill workers did not have deal with. These men were not in a comfortable financial situation at home, and could not find comfort in hazardous working conditions with the dangerous machines they had to operate. Workers were harmed daily and among these injured employees were children (Shi 62). Many of these children were as young as nine years old, and due to financial reasons their families sent them away to work in workshops, mines, and even in factories surrounded by dangerous machinery. Realistically, these children were doomed to working in a factory for their entire lives.

Constantly working in these conditions is not ideal. Working like this on a daily basis has caused exhaustion and even death in the workplace (Goldman 3). Clearly people working ... ... middle of paper ... ...se problems, and they are trying to do what is best for the workers. There are a lot of migrant workers in China in bad conditions where the factories are poorly lit, and very cramped. A lot of these heinous conditions are caused from the little enforcement of labor laws by the government.

Working shifts were beyond the control of the workers and the job was not necessarily stable because workers could be fired at any time for any reason (OI: “Working Conditions”). Moreover, the working environment was cramped and caused many problems to arise, such as the death of workers. The working class suffered greatly from the consequences of the Industrial Revolution. However, they also experienced many improvements in life such as the decrease in