Pandora Cases Being Made In China...

[aesir911]

so... enough about economics and morality issues. do you have any information about this company craigix? or will the FTAA (or whatever the fair trade association is in the U.K.) come after you and beat you with your own stick if the information leaks outs?

 

[willrandship]

As long as I get a pandora, I couldn't care less about where it's made. (it has to be in english though )

 

[fusion_power]

A user here once guessed the Name of the Factory with "DELAY INC." I agree! :lol:

With this speed, the Pandora Team better should start with Developing the case for Pandora 2 yet.

 

[droneb]

may i also add that
the first one adds the option in life to educate your children to get better life conditions,
instead of chaining them to the very same life every day every generation?

unless they like to be the same forever i wouldnt say they would turn back.

 

[j.pickens]

Supposed "Fair Trade" has had exactly the opposite effect for coffee growers in South America and Africa.
I see nothing to suggest that these governmental know-nothings will do any better in other industries.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthcomment/3326587/Halo-of-Fairtrade-casts-a-shadow-on-poverty.html

juicy quote:

Most Fairtrade coffee is roasted and packaged in Europe, principally in Belgium and Germany. That is unnecessary and retards development. Farmers working for Costa Rica's Café Britt have climbed the economic ladder not just by growing beans but by doing the processing, roasting and packaging and branding themselves. But Café Britt is not welcome on the Fairtrade scheme. Most Café Britt farmers are self-employed small business people who own the land they farm. That is unacceptable to the ideologues at FLO International, Fairtrade's international certifiers, who will accredit farmers only if they give up their small-business status and join together into a co-operative.

There is evidence that Fairtrade is damaging quality, too. Its farmers typically sell in both Fairtrade and open markets. Because the price in the open market is solely determined by quality, they sell their better beans in that market and then dump their poorer beans into the Fairtrade market, where they are guaranteed a good price. That's worth considering next time you pop out for an espresso.

 

[jlepley]

From what I can tell, (and somebody correct me on this if you can prove me wrong; my research consisted of Ctrl+F-ing "legal" on the Wikipedia page) fair trade has almost no legal weight whatsoever. If that is the case, then this is pretty much a non-issue.

 

[Chip]

If there were any real legal stricture against products made by underpaid, mistreated peasants in underdeveloped countries, we'd all be naked and starving for lack of things to wear and eat. Most of the things you own were made by someone who makes less in a year than you do in a week. No point in getting all soppy about it now.

 

[grasshoppir]

Supposed "Fair Trade" has had exactly the opposite effect for coffee growers in South America and Africa.
I see nothing to suggest that these governmental know-nothings will do any better in other industries.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthcomment/3326587/Halo-of-Fairtrade-casts-a-shadow-on-poverty.html

juicy quote:

Most Fairtrade coffee is roasted and packaged in Europe, principally in Belgium and Germany. That is unnecessary and retards development. Farmers working for Costa Rica's Café Britt have climbed the economic ladder not just by growing beans but by doing the processing, roasting and packaging and branding themselves. But Café Britt is not welcome on the Fairtrade scheme. Most Café Britt farmers are self-employed small business people who own the land they farm. That is unacceptable to the ideologues at FLO International, Fairtrade's international certifiers, who will accredit farmers only if they give up their small-business status and join together into a co-operative.

There is evidence that Fairtrade is damaging quality, too. Its farmers typically sell in both Fairtrade and open markets. Because the price in the open market is solely determined by quality, they sell their better beans in that market and then dump their poorer beans into the Fairtrade market, where they are guaranteed a good price. That's worth considering next time you pop out for an espresso.

yeah except theres trade laws..

 

[Pleng]

If there were any real legal stricture against products made by underpaid, mistreated peasants in underdeveloped countries, we'd all be naked and starving for lack of things to wear and eat. Most of the things you own were made by someone who makes less in a year than you do in a week. No point in getting all soppy about it now.

That's not really fair or true. We might need to spend more money on clothes and food and thus have less money for computers and Pandoras and SD cards and Wiis, but the sad truth is there is enough food and clothes to go around the world and not one person needs to starve or freeze to death.

Fair trade, however, is not the solution. It lifts x people marginally off the breadline but leave 3(x) people with nothing at all.

And before anybody asks, no, I don't have the solution. I wish I did.

 

[laurencevde]

The solution is time. China will sort itself out eventually, but you can't force it. If china would be more humane, they would be less competitive, and less money would flow to china, so less people would have a job. The situation in china is improving as more and more people get a job(any job is better than no job...), and the domestic market is growing. China still has a large amount of unemployed people, and they will take any job they can get. Once china runs out of unemployed, their workforce will start looking at better jobs, and salaries and working conditions will rise. It just takes time, and forcing it will just slow down the process.

 

[mali]

The solution is time. China will sort itself out eventually, but you can't force it. If china would be more humane, they would be less competitive, and less money would flow to china, so less people would have a job. The situation in china is improving as more and more people get a job(any job is better than no job...), and the domestic market is growing. China still has a large amount of unemployed people, and they will take any job they can get. Once china runs out of unemployed, their workforce will start looking at better jobs, and salaries and working conditions will rise. It just takes time, and forcing it will just slow down the process.

+1

There are certain empirical rules the industrialisation follows. You can speed up the process by destroying a state structure and forcing development by domination from outside, like after WW2 in Germany or Japan. The biggest additional problem nowadays is flooding the market of third/second world economies with goods from overproduction of first world economies. This harms local structures and slows down industrialisation.

 

[intense_mc]

Some of these comments are unbelieveable...but then I remember someone telling me, on the issue of those starving to death in the Africas, "it's their own fault. They don't do anything about it."

Even after pointing him to, say, the best-selling "Confessions of An Economic Hitman" eg:

"Economic hit men (EHMs) are highly-paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. They funnel money from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and other foreign "aid" organizations into the coffers of huge corporations and the pockets of a few wealthy families who control the planet's natural resources. Their tools included fraudulent financial reports, rigged elections, payoffs, extortion, sex, and murder. They play a game as old as empire, but one that has taken on new and terrifying dimensions during this time of globalization."

...or other such evidences - the reply was (without researching said or similiar information) "it's still their fault."

Willful ignorance.

What has this to do with working conditions in China? It's the same attitude. Even if you was to point out the agenda from the people who administer it you will still hear "no, it's not like that."

Which someone will undoubtedly reply to this post with. To which I say, think like that. If it was you in those shoes you would say "oh please, why won't people show some concern???"

If you don't care, then don't debate - just don't make out to be intelligent when, really, you just don't give a toss.

 

[mali]

I'll reply to the above later, because I'm at work right now. Take time to back up what you are saying in the meantime. "It's not like that" or something is not enough I do care, but the problems are much more dificult than you think. If you do the wrong thing, you'll make them worse. I didn't say "it's their own fault". It's our fault and fair trade stuff and development aid is part of the problem.

Edit:
I changed my mind, I won't discuss this further. We had it before with "Free Rice" and it won't end well. Thanks, I'm out

 

[WizardStan]

Some of these comments are unbelieveable...but then I remember someone telling me, on the issue of those starving to death in the Africas, "it's their own fault. They don't do anything about it."

No one in this thread has said "it's their own fault" or anything even close to that. In fact, it has been almost entirely "yes, things are bad and need to get better". I fail to see what's so unbelievable about that.
The two sides of this debate seem to be "we should boycott Chinese products until they improve working conditions" vs "improvements need to happen gradually or the whole thing will collapse". Though I thank you for your opinion, it was entirely irrelevant to the debate that I was quite enjoying. Please avoid muddying the water with your misunderstandings in the future, it will only cause confusion in the debate.
Thank you.

 

[intense_mc]

Oh - I wasn't referring to you at all mali.

And wizardstan, please read my post again - CAREFULLY. I never said anyone said that, I gave an analogy and even said why I gave that analogy.

Thanks.

And please, (not referring to you wizardstan, just to anyone who disagrees) if you want to refute, please don't refute me, refute the author of that book. Maybe email him.

n.b...just to add (to make it relevant) it's not like it everywhere in China, just certain places. And it's usually the big big brands, and sometimes they're innocently ignorant aswell.

 

[aesir911]

The solution is time. China will sort itself out eventually, but you can't force it. If china would be more humane, they would be less competitive, and less money would flow to china, so less people would have a job. The situation in china is improving as more and more people get a job(any job is better than no job...), and the domestic market is growing. China still has a large amount of unemployed people, and they will take any job they can get. Once china runs out of unemployed, their workforce will start looking at better jobs, and salaries and working conditions will rise. It just takes time, and forcing it will just slow down the process.

yeah, the communist elitist country will solve it's problems through time. not a chance. the rich will remain rich and the poor will be forever poor (the society ladder remains in much of Asia). the time factor is a bunch of crap. like russia's bogus 4-year plans and Obama's already failed time plans to raise the economy and involvement in Afghanistan.

 

[WizardStan]

And wizardstan, please read my post again - CAREFULLY. I never said anyone said that, I gave an analogy and even said why I gave that analogy.

I did read your post very carefully, thrice. As I said, your anecdote, while understood and appreciated, had no bearing on the rest of the discussion. You suggested that some of the previous posts were "willfully ignorant" and definitely said that someone would say "no, it's not like that" which suggests you missed the point of the discussion entirely. That is why I tried to correct you; there's no debate about whether it's like that or not, it's been established that it is. The debate is whether forcing change through boycott will work, or if the risk of collapse is too great and a course of slower internal change is better.

 

[Xanas]

Even after pointing him to, say, the best-selling "Confessions of An Economic Hitman"

So every bestselling book is undisputed in accuracy?

 

[droneb]

Even after pointing him to, say, the best-selling "Confessions of An Economic Hitman"

So every bestselling book is undisputed in accuracy?

Haha, nice one!

really you cannot believe what books say, China's common people got severed from the global society mostly because of that
the vary same apply for books about polytics like comunism and agressive capitalism.

back to chinese, do you remember that jap products used to be "bad Quality Expectancy" now look where they are.

from what ive seen and leant, slow growing comunity are always more stable than pop economy, and i believe thats due because the
next generation after the last harsh one always go spoiled.

 

[Nova]

If there were any real legal stricture against products made by underpaid, mistreated peasants in underdeveloped countries, we'd all be naked and starving for lack of things to wear and eat. Most of the things you own were made by someone who makes less in a year than you do in a week. No point in getting all soppy about it now.

I would consider that you are an official voice of the OpenPandora team before semi-condoning such practices. I'm no bleeding heart, and my opinions are my own, but I would assume OP would want to distance themselves as far as possible from that view.