David Gurney
HOPR 1105
Final Paper
Wal-Mart’s Half-Secret Child Labor Associations
Since I have begun researching Wal-Mart’s association with child labor, I have found myself in a number of discussions where child labor was mentioned in association with today’s world. The general response to this was usually something along the lines of, “child labor? What is this, the 1930’s? That doesn’t happen anymore, does it?”
The number of facts and figures that I have come across in a short time of researching this topic is enough to convince me that the general public, or at least the people that I have talked too, are either voluntarily or involuntarily oblivious to the enormity of child labor being used in today’s world; in many instances, to produce the clothing and other essential things that we buy here in the United States (LexisNexis, 2005).
According to a report launched by UNICEF, one in twelve of the world’s children (80 million young people below the age of 18) are involved in the worst forms of child labor – hazardous work, slavery, forced labor, commercial sexual exploitation and illicit activities. Ninety-seven percent of these are in developing countries (UNICEF, 2005). Unfortunately, it seems as if child labor is quite pervasive in today’s world.
The issue of Wal-Mart using children in foreign countries as labor in some of their factories first arose in 1996, when Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the National Labor Committee, revealed in a congressional hearing that workers in a Honduran factory producing clothing for the Kathie Lee Gifford line were children. Ten percent of the workers were found to be between ages 13-15. The publicity generated by this incident was quite damaging to Wal-Mart since forbidding child labor is one of the absolutes of the global economy (Fishman, 2006). A pair of workers were brought overseas by the NLC and testified before congress as to the conditions under which they worked. Testimony from the workers included accounts of physical abuse. One worker stated that if she didn’t sew to the mandated pace, 120 pairs of pants per hour, a supervisor would slap her across the face with the pants she was sewing. Wal-Mart did not challenge this report. Other conditions reported by the two female workers included lack of breaks for water and bathroom, forced overtime, banned talking among workers, verbal abuse by managers to work faster, along with many others. Four armed guards were present at the factory to intimidate workers (Asghar, 2001).
Since the Kathy Lee Gifford incident, Wal-Mart has attempted to make their use of inspections in overseas factories more public in order to shed a more positive light on their image. A factory “code of conduct” is required by Wal-Mart to be signed by the managers of all its supplier factories, as well as being posted in the factory in the language of the workers. In 2004, 12,500 inspections were conducted by Wal-Mart, more than 30 a day, which led to 108 factories being banned from doing business with Wal-Mart due to serious violations of Wal-Mart’s factory code. Another 1,211 factories were punished by cutting off business for a certain period. 260 of these factories corrected violations and were allowed to begin business with Wal-Mart again (Fishman, 2006). This is the positive interpretation of Wal-Mart’s data. However, since the incident in 1996, a number of independent investigators have uncovered labor abuses in overseas factories, including the use of child labor in production. All of this was behind Wal-Mart’s back of course, since they openly oppose independent investigations into the conditions of their factories overseas. Independent investigations are the “Gold Standard” because they provide less data that is less likely to be biased. They also tend to provide more unannounced inspections, as well as off-site interviews, which provide a more realistic look at a factories practices (Fishman, 2006). In one investigation by the NLC, a 13-year-old female worker from Bangladesh was found and interviewed. She reported being forced to work from 7:30a.m. to 3:00a.m. for the last three months. She would sleep by her sewing machine for four hours, wake up, and start sewing again. She was called a prostitute and a whore by her supervisor and paid 1 cent per 30 pieces of clothing completed (NLC, 2002).
One way to try to understand the gap between Wal-Mart’s reports of inspections and other reports of obvious abuses like the one mentioned above, it to look at Wal-Mart’s numbers in a different way. Charles Fishman (2006) has this to say about the matter:
Although 12,500 inspections were conducted in 2004, only 8% were unannounced. Even so, Wal-Mart reports that 9,900 of the inspections resulted in violations serious enough to either suspend a factory or put it on notice. 8,900 inspections of factories in 2004 revealed serious violations in factories that knew in advance that Wal-Mart inspectors were coming! (p. 189)
What would happen if 90% of these inspections were unannounced?
The largest problem with Wal-Mart’s inspection process is just that: it IS Wal-Mart’s inspection process. Wal-Mart does not allow independent inspections of any of its overseas factories. Such inspections are the gold standard, as they avoid a conflict of interest and are much more likely to reveal accurate data with surprise inspections and off-site interviews with workers. KLD & Company, the leading institution which measures corporate social responsibility, dropped Wal-Mart from its list of responsible investments, saying that Wal-Mart has not done enough to ensure that its domestic and international vendors operate factories that meet adequate labor and human rights standards. KLD notes that Wal-Mart’s market dominance puts it in a unique position to lead retailers in a cleanup of sweatshop abuses. However, to date it has declined to do so (Thomsen, 2001).
It is important to remember that it is Wal-Mart itself that dictates the sometimes unbelievably low prices in its stores. These prices don’t come for free however. They are at the expense of the pay provided to the producers of these products, from the distributors, all the way down to the factory workers (NLC, 2002).
Despite the absolute opposition to child labor in the United States, and the heavy enforcement of child labor laws, we need not even cross the border to find incidences of Wal-Mart using illegal child labor in its factories and stores. In 2005, Wal-Mart agreed to pay $135, 540 to settle child labor violations in 24 separate incidents. These abuses involved the use of children in operating machinery designated for over 18 workers only. In addition to this, Wal-Mart was fined $205,650 for 1,436 violations of child labor laws for the period 1995-1998. The Department of Labor agreed to give Wal-Mart 15 days notice before visiting and/or investigating allegations of wage and hour violations in the future, part of what critics call the “sweetheart” deal offered to Wal-Mart for its settlement of child labor violations (Wakeup, 2005).
Wal-Mart’s latest child labor scandal came in 2005 when the Canadian Broadcast Company planted a number of its reports in Bangladesh factories posed as merchandise buyers. The reporters took pictures of children working in dirty and dim conditions. A 10 year old was found working on a T-shirt with the slogan “I Love My Wal-Mart” printed on it. Wal-Mart immediately pulled its business from these factories. This “cut and run” strategy used by Wal-Mart in incidences of abuse is often cities by critics as doing to nothing to solve the problem of labor abuses, but only hurting the workers in the factories effected (LexisNexis, 2005).
This paper cannot even come close to describing the depth of the associations between not only Wal-Mart, but a number of other corporations, and child labor, not to mention a plethora of other blatantly unethical business practices. Uncovering just a tiny portion of these labor abuses has taught me a number of things. There is a massive gap between what really is going on in the world with child labor, and what the average person thinks is going on. In our modern world of 24-hour news shows and internet reporting, it is difficult to understand how such a huge issue as child labor could be swept under the table, apparently so well as to convince a number of people that is no longer even exists
The scope of this problem cannot be adequately described in this particular paper. Suffice to say that the abuse of children in any way is perhaps the most horribly immoral and unethical practice that any person or entity could engage in. Most people are disgusted by the very notion of child abuse. And yet it continues to be practiced by the very powers that dictate a great part of our lives, the corporations. In order for this to change, awareness must first be gained by the general population. More light needs to be shed on a topic that is normally confined to the darkest shadows.
Bibliography
Asghar, Sajeed (2001). TED Case Studies: Kathy Lee Gifford & Sweat Shop Allegations
Retrieved April 10, 2006, from http://www.american.edu/TED/kathylee.htm
Fishman, Charles (2006). The Wal-Mart Effect. New York, NY: The Penguin Group.
LexisNexis Academic (2005). Radio-Canada investigation claims Wal-Mart suppliers
use child labour. Retrieved April 10, 2006, from http://web.lexis-nexis.com.web
mail2.hampshire.edu:2048/universe/
National Labor Committee (2002). Working for Wal-Mart. Retrieved April 10, 2006,
from www.nlcnet.org/news/Selinas_Story.pdf
Thomsen, Mark (2001). Wal-Mart booted out of the Domini 400. Retrieved April 10,
2006, from http://www.sri-adviser.com/article.mpl?sfArticleId=552
UNICEF (2005). One in twelve of the world’s children are forced into child labour.
Retrieved April 10, 2006, from http://www.unicef.org.uk/press/news_detail.asp?
news_id=392
Wakeup Wal-Mart (2005). Wal-Mart & Child Labor Violations. Retrieved April 10,
2006, from http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/downloads/wal-mart-child-labor-
facts.pdf
HOPR 1105
Final Paper
Wal-Mart’s Half-Secret Child Labor Associations
Since I have begun researching Wal-Mart’s association with child labor, I have found myself in a number of discussions where child labor was mentioned in association with today’s world. The general response to this was usually something along the lines of, “child labor? What is this, the 1930’s? That doesn’t happen anymore, does it?”
The number of facts and figures that I have come across in a short time of researching this topic is enough to convince me that the general public, or at least the people that I have talked too, are either voluntarily or involuntarily oblivious to the enormity of child labor being used in today’s world; in many instances, to produce the clothing and other essential things that we buy here in the United States (LexisNexis, 2005).
According to a report launched by UNICEF, one in twelve of the world’s children (80 million young people below the age of 18) are involved in the worst forms of child labor – hazardous work, slavery, forced labor, commercial sexual exploitation and illicit activities. Ninety-seven percent of these are in developing countries (UNICEF, 2005). Unfortunately, it seems as if child labor is quite pervasive in today’s world.
The issue of Wal-Mart using children in foreign countries as labor in some of their factories first arose in 1996, when Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the National Labor Committee, revealed in a congressional hearing that workers in a Honduran factory producing clothing for the Kathie Lee Gifford line were children. Ten percent of the workers were found to be between ages 13-15. The publicity generated by this incident was quite damaging to Wal-Mart since forbidding child labor is one of the absolutes of the global economy (Fishman, 2006). A pair of workers were brought overseas by the NLC and testified before congress as to the conditions under which they worked. Testimony from the workers included accounts of physical abuse. One worker stated that if she didn’t sew to the mandated pace, 120 pairs of pants per hour, a supervisor would slap her across the face with the pants she was sewing. Wal-Mart did not challenge this report. Other conditions reported by the two female workers included lack of breaks for water and bathroom, forced overtime, banned talking among workers, verbal abuse by managers to work faster, along with many others. Four armed guards were present at the factory to intimidate workers (Asghar, 2001).
Since the Kathy Lee Gifford incident, Wal-Mart has attempted to make their use of inspections in overseas factories more public in order to shed a more positive light on their image. A factory “code of conduct” is required by Wal-Mart to be signed by the managers of all its supplier factories, as well as being posted in the factory in the language of the workers. In 2004, 12,500 inspections were conducted by Wal-Mart, more than 30 a day, which led to 108 factories being banned from doing business with Wal-Mart due to serious violations of Wal-Mart’s factory code. Another 1,211 factories were punished by cutting off business for a certain period. 260 of these factories corrected violations and were allowed to begin business with Wal-Mart again (Fishman, 2006). This is the positive interpretation of Wal-Mart’s data. However, since the incident in 1996, a number of independent investigators have uncovered labor abuses in overseas factories, including the use of child labor in production. All of this was behind Wal-Mart’s back of course, since they openly oppose independent investigations into the conditions of their factories overseas. Independent investigations are the “Gold Standard” because they provide less data that is less likely to be biased. They also tend to provide more unannounced inspections, as well as off-site interviews, which provide a more realistic look at a factories practices (Fishman, 2006). In one investigation by the NLC, a 13-year-old female worker from Bangladesh was found and interviewed. She reported being forced to work from 7:30a.m. to 3:00a.m. for the last three months. She would sleep by her sewing machine for four hours, wake up, and start sewing again. She was called a prostitute and a whore by her supervisor and paid 1 cent per 30 pieces of clothing completed (NLC, 2002).
One way to try to understand the gap between Wal-Mart’s reports of inspections and other reports of obvious abuses like the one mentioned above, it to look at Wal-Mart’s numbers in a different way. Charles Fishman (2006) has this to say about the matter:
Although 12,500 inspections were conducted in 2004, only 8% were unannounced. Even so, Wal-Mart reports that 9,900 of the inspections resulted in violations serious enough to either suspend a factory or put it on notice. 8,900 inspections of factories in 2004 revealed serious violations in factories that knew in advance that Wal-Mart inspectors were coming! (p. 189)
What would happen if 90% of these inspections were unannounced?
The largest problem with Wal-Mart’s inspection process is just that: it IS Wal-Mart’s inspection process. Wal-Mart does not allow independent inspections of any of its overseas factories. Such inspections are the gold standard, as they avoid a conflict of interest and are much more likely to reveal accurate data with surprise inspections and off-site interviews with workers. KLD & Company, the leading institution which measures corporate social responsibility, dropped Wal-Mart from its list of responsible investments, saying that Wal-Mart has not done enough to ensure that its domestic and international vendors operate factories that meet adequate labor and human rights standards. KLD notes that Wal-Mart’s market dominance puts it in a unique position to lead retailers in a cleanup of sweatshop abuses. However, to date it has declined to do so (Thomsen, 2001).
It is important to remember that it is Wal-Mart itself that dictates the sometimes unbelievably low prices in its stores. These prices don’t come for free however. They are at the expense of the pay provided to the producers of these products, from the distributors, all the way down to the factory workers (NLC, 2002).
Despite the absolute opposition to child labor in the United States, and the heavy enforcement of child labor laws, we need not even cross the border to find incidences of Wal-Mart using illegal child labor in its factories and stores. In 2005, Wal-Mart agreed to pay $135, 540 to settle child labor violations in 24 separate incidents. These abuses involved the use of children in operating machinery designated for over 18 workers only. In addition to this, Wal-Mart was fined $205,650 for 1,436 violations of child labor laws for the period 1995-1998. The Department of Labor agreed to give Wal-Mart 15 days notice before visiting and/or investigating allegations of wage and hour violations in the future, part of what critics call the “sweetheart” deal offered to Wal-Mart for its settlement of child labor violations (Wakeup, 2005).
Wal-Mart’s latest child labor scandal came in 2005 when the Canadian Broadcast Company planted a number of its reports in Bangladesh factories posed as merchandise buyers. The reporters took pictures of children working in dirty and dim conditions. A 10 year old was found working on a T-shirt with the slogan “I Love My Wal-Mart” printed on it. Wal-Mart immediately pulled its business from these factories. This “cut and run” strategy used by Wal-Mart in incidences of abuse is often cities by critics as doing to nothing to solve the problem of labor abuses, but only hurting the workers in the factories effected (LexisNexis, 2005).
This paper cannot even come close to describing the depth of the associations between not only Wal-Mart, but a number of other corporations, and child labor, not to mention a plethora of other blatantly unethical business practices. Uncovering just a tiny portion of these labor abuses has taught me a number of things. There is a massive gap between what really is going on in the world with child labor, and what the average person thinks is going on. In our modern world of 24-hour news shows and internet reporting, it is difficult to understand how such a huge issue as child labor could be swept under the table, apparently so well as to convince a number of people that is no longer even exists
The scope of this problem cannot be adequately described in this particular paper. Suffice to say that the abuse of children in any way is perhaps the most horribly immoral and unethical practice that any person or entity could engage in. Most people are disgusted by the very notion of child abuse. And yet it continues to be practiced by the very powers that dictate a great part of our lives, the corporations. In order for this to change, awareness must first be gained by the general population. More light needs to be shed on a topic that is normally confined to the darkest shadows.
Bibliography
Asghar, Sajeed (2001). TED Case Studies: Kathy Lee Gifford & Sweat Shop Allegations
Retrieved April 10, 2006, from http://www.american.edu/TED/kathylee.htm
Fishman, Charles (2006). The Wal-Mart Effect. New York, NY: The Penguin Group.
LexisNexis Academic (2005). Radio-Canada investigation claims Wal-Mart suppliers
use child labour. Retrieved April 10, 2006, from http://web.lexis-nexis.com.web
mail2.hampshire.edu:2048/universe/
National Labor Committee (2002). Working for Wal-Mart. Retrieved April 10, 2006,
from www.nlcnet.org/news/Selinas_Story.pdf
Thomsen, Mark (2001). Wal-Mart booted out of the Domini 400. Retrieved April 10,
2006, from http://www.sri-adviser.com/article.mpl?sfArticleId=552
UNICEF (2005). One in twelve of the world’s children are forced into child labour.
Retrieved April 10, 2006, from http://www.unicef.org.uk/press/news_detail.asp?
news_id=392
Wakeup Wal-Mart (2005). Wal-Mart & Child Labor Violations. Retrieved April 10,
2006, from http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/downloads/wal-mart-child-labor-
facts.pdf
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