http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/11/25/workers-die-in-bangladesh-factory-while-making-clothes-for-walmart-and-others/In an stunning cultural juxtaposition, Black Friday merchants counted their profits and victory-pumped shoppers celebrated their “scores” in malls throughout the U.S., while factory workers on the other side of the world who made many of the clothing items shoppers bought this weekend jumped from windows of a seven-story factory in the effort to save their lives in a late Saturday inferno. Many of them were not successful; as of the most recent count, 124 of those workers have died, with many more injured.In the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka, a large garment run by Tazreen Fashions, one of the many factories in the area that provide product for American companies including Wal-mart, JC Penney’s, the Gap, Levi Strauss, Kohl’s, Zara, H & M, and others, burst into flames Saturday night in a fire (of currently unknown origin) that started on the bottom floor of the building and quickly rushed up the other floors, trapping workers with no way to descend from the building. As India Today reports:By Sunday morning, firefighters had recovered 115 bodies, fire department Operations Director Maj. Mohammad Mahbub said. He said another 9 people who had suffered injuries after jumping from the building to escape the fire later died at hospitals.Mahbub said firefighters recovered 69 bodies from the second floor of the factory alone. He said most of the victims had been trapped inside the factory, located just outside of Dhaka, with no emergency exits leading outside the building.
how many Americans reconcile their patronage of these retail giants knowing of the labor market for those who manufacture their goods are living sub standard lives so they can strut their stuff?
that may be harsh but it's known this goes on and as long as there's a market it will continue, and those jobs will remain there. that is a territorial problem that impacts those countries people ours is more of a moral issue.
“The factory had three staircases, and all of them were down through the ground floor,” Mahbub said. “So the workers could not come out when the fire engulfed the building. Had there been at least one emergency exit through outside the factory, the casualties would have been much lower.”
What is particularly stunning about this story is that welfare and safety problems of many of the garment factories of Bangladesh, including those in Dhaka, have been at the epicenter of turbulent worker vs. employer strife for many years, most recently on September 20th, 2012, when “tens of thousands” of garment factory workers near Dhaka clashed with police in protest against low wages and dangerous working conditions. Beyond the sub-standard safety issues rampant in most buildings (such as no external exits of the kind workers in this recent conflagration needed),
this is the picture the republicans see for us, union bustiing no negotiations for health, safe conditions, deregulation sub standard pay. this is the template for the right wing economic plan.
