Foxconn in my mind essay

In the eyes of many workers, factories that work a lot of overtime are "good factories" because "if you don't work overtime, you can't make any money at all." ?

We produce the world's top electronic products, but we accumulate wealth at the slowest speed. Public account passwords for office systems are set to end in "888", and like many business people, we like this number. But perhaps few of them know that it is their own hands that protect the country's "8", but we work overtime every day, buy lottery tickets, and even buy horses, but it is difficult to find our own "8"?

< p>I know two groups of young people. ?

A group of college students live in an ivory tower, surrounded by libraries, lakes and mountains. The other group works in a factory area with steel machines, huge containers, and countless complicated and precise production links. This group of people always calls their superiors "boss", and even if they are not familiar with each other, they loudly use swear words to call each other "mao". ?

I have been trying to connect these two pictures. But it's difficult. It's just that the people living in these two places do have the same age and the same youthful dreams. ?

The Foxconn “13-jump” series of suicides in June and July deeply shocked me. This is not because we understand why they died, but because we know how they live. ?

We Foxconn employees commute to and from get off work every day, going to and from fixed workshops and dormitories, but we don’t know the future direction. ?

Those of us who earn low wages and will never make a fortune are keen on buying lottery tickets and horses to put our hopes in. ?

The most generous day in our lives is the 7th of every month, the day when wages are paid. On this day, there will be long queues at ATMs and specialty restaurants, so that ATMs are often empty. The salary consists of the local minimum basic salary of 1,200 yuan plus variable monthly overtime pay.

I remember that when we entered the factory, each of our employees would sign a "Voluntary Overtime Work Agreement", and then our overtime hours would no longer be subject to the legal limit of 36 hours per month. But this is not a "bad thing". On the contrary, in the eyes of many workers, factories that work a lot of overtime are "good factories" because "if you don't work overtime, you can't make any money at all." For workers who are eager to make money, working overtime is more like "breathing pain": if they don't work overtime, the days without money will make them "suffocate"; if they work overtime, the tiring work day and night will only make the body more "painful", Aging rapidly. More often than not, they firmly choose the latter, and even the right to choose is not easily available. Only if the boss is "trusted", has a good relationship, or is in a key position, can he often work overtime. ?

So, the May Day holiday has become a worry for some people, because it is "very difficult" to spend money but not make money. On this day, the workers don't care about what day it is, what's more important is overtime pay; if that's not possible, it's more practical to sleep in. ?

At the entrance of the newly opened mobile phone store, the salesman proudly showed off the iPhone to the onlookers. Everyone stared closely at his every "cool" operation, as if they were watching something novel. . But in fact, Foxconn produces accessories for almost all well-known brands of digital products, including iPhones and iPads. Every part of that "novel" machine comes from the hands of these workers, but they never thought of owning the final product. . Now, these finished products appear in front of you at a "shock price" of 6,599 yuan, which is several times higher than their monthly salary. It was an expensive purchase, so they only discussed how to spend a few hundred yuan on a copycat phone. ?

At first, I felt like an outsider. Many times when I chatted with them, I was speechless. I felt that I was too happy. They actually envy those who can take time off due to work-related injuries, and they joke about how toxic their jobs are. When they discuss their colleagues who committed suicide by jumping off a building, they are often surprisingly calm or disdainful, or even joking, as if everyone is an outsider. ?

I would like to see them as a group of optimistic and persevering people, and I hope they really have nothing to do with it. However, no matter how you think about this wish, it is inevitably a kind of sadness. I even imagined that I had the power to change all this, but it was just like Wang Kezhu saying when he was working the night shift, "I really hope someone can kick him in exchange for a 5-minute break." It was very naive and impossible.

?

You have to ask us workers what their dreams are, and the answers are the same. Doing business, making money, getting rich, and everything else will come after this. In the factory warehouse, they humorously call the hydraulic truck that pulls goods "BMW". They would rather own a real BMW, or at least "BMW"-style wealth. ?

We sometimes fantasize, and then constantly tear apart our fantasies ourselves, like a painful painter, helplessly tearing up his unformable manuscript, "If you keep doing this, you will never think about it for the rest of your life." We produce the world's top electronic products, but we accumulate wealth at the slowest speed. The public account password of the office system is set to end with "888". Like many businessmen, we like this number and even believe in its homophony. But perhaps few of us know that it is our own hands that protect the country's "8". However, we work overtime every day, buy lottery tickets, and even buy horses, but it is difficult to find our own "8". ?

Wang Kezhu, who worked the hardest, always complained that his salary was too low. He wanted to sign up to learn something outside, but he "couldn't even understand it", so he gave up. He said that if you have too little knowledge, you can only do the most inferior work. This is destined. Sometimes he said he had a headache, and sometimes he felt instantly refreshed. When pulling goods, he always runs forward, as if the two pallets and 24 boxes of goods don't weigh much at all. Every day he would climb up the two- to three-meter-high container to take stock of the accounts, and he would also get into the cracks to check the identification sheets. I asked him why he was working so hard, but he didn't answer. Until one morning I saw him stop in front of a pillar and suddenly shouted: "Help!" He probably didn't know what he just said, but I heard a group of True soul. They are used to trying their best to change, until their efforts turn into struggles, and they are not sure whether they have the strength to break out of the cocoon of life. ?

The factory buildings in the factory area are neatly erected. Apart from the serial numbers on the top that are composed of English letters and numbers, they have almost no special features. The same goes for the machines in the factory, the containers in the warehouse, and even the workers in neat work clothes on the assembly line. One morning, I was on my way to work when I saw two faces peeking out of the windows of the factory. They remained motionless, looking at the flow of people on the road. It's too far away, so you can't see the expression or hear the sound. There are only two black spots in the window. But from their position, the road was undoubtedly a large group of moving black spots. Against the background of the huge white factory building, they were small and uniform. Workers in this factory use their hands to control the assembly and production of the world's most cutting-edge electronic products, constantly breaking exciting trade records, and ranking first in mainland China's export volume for seven consecutive years. But it seems that while we control the machine, the machine also controls us: parts flow through each link of the assembly line and are processed into shape; our single and pure youth is also wasted in the unique rhythm of the machine. ?

At four o'clock in the morning, I finished using the toilet and pressed my ear against the wall of the workshop corridor. I heard the rumble of machines coming from all directions, with a steady frequency. It was the heartbeat of this factory. Workers work, walk and eat under the control of this natural frequency every day. Now I understand why I walk so fast on the factory road and eat so quickly in the canteen without anyone urging me. Not comfortable though. Like every component, you enter this assembly line, obey the rhythm, belong to the heartbeat at four o'clock in the morning, and cannot escape. ?

When Shenzhen, a former border town, suddenly became one of the most prosperous cities on the east coast of the Pearl River Delta, behind the rows of high-rise buildings, what I met was a group of confused and anxious young people. people. Time magazine named Chinese workers on its annual cover in 2009. The magazine said that Chinese workers illuminate the future of mankind with their "perseverance and perseverance." However, the so-called "perseverance" means enduring the alienation of machines and capital. Qualities necessary for erosion. Is such "perseverance" still something they can bear? When computers, mobile phones, cars, every commodity becomes the product of capital, sweat, youth, and even life, every value is consumed by capital. ?

This giant factory, which houses more than 400,000 people, is not the "sweatshop" that people imagine. It provided food and lodging, was the size of a medium-sized town, was streamlined and well organized. Compared with similar hotels, the facilities here are complete and superior, and the treatment is standard and standardized.

Thousands of people flock here every day, just to find a place for themselves and a dream that they may never realize. ?

This is not the inside story of a factory, this is the fate of a generation of workers.