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Where's Nike's concern for its shoemakers?
April 3, 1997, Tuesday.
A current commercial for Nike shoes shows a group counselor working with various speedy athletes so they can be made to feel positive about themselves. "It's OK to be fast" is the counselor's pitch. Pretty absurd and possibly funny.
Back in the real world, if the Nike people want to help anyone, they should direct their attention to the impoverished young women who make a million of their expensive shoes each month in five factories in Vietnam.
Thuyen Nguyen, a New Jersey businessman who left Vietnam in 1975, returned to his native land for a two-week inspection of factories under contract to make Nikes.
His report says workers get $ 1.60 a day for hours that stretch well beyond what we would consider a normal work day. That's not enough to buy three meals a day, to say nothing of life's other needs.
The women are harassed and mistreated. They get dizzy from hunger. Corporal punishment is common. In one case, a floor manager forced 56 women to run around the factory on a hot day as punishment for wearing shoes that did not meet regulations. Many fainted and had to be sent to the hospital. There are cases where supervisors have molested the women. One bathroom break per eight-hour shift is said to be the quota.
The factories are under contract so Nike can disclaim direct responsibility. That's too convenient. Nike and other apparel companies that have their goods made with cheap labor in Third World factories should face up to their exploitation and insist on at least subsistence wages and humane working conditions for the laborers who make their products.
And American consumers -- the buyers of the expensive shoes -- should push them, if necessary. Otherwise we get a slice of the blame.
Nike in the News