Labor unrest in China

According to IHT, there has been rioting at a China factory that supplies toys to four large American companies. The rioting of the Chinese workers, as you might guess, is the result of poor wages and living conditions.

Details:

Labor rights activists claim that pent-up frustrations over working conditions at the factory, which supplies plastic toys to several iconic American brands, including Disney, McDonald's, Mattel and Hasbro, erupted last Saturday and Sunday.

At the height of the protest, more than 1,000 workers at the factory clashed with security guards and police officers, resulting in many injuries, according to China Labor Watch, a New York-based worker rights group.

Although the violence is unfortunate, I hope it lights a fire that grows all across China and forces China to start paying fairer wages. US companies have been eagerly shutting down US factories and sending that work overseas while executive compensation at these greed-motivated companies has been growing by leaps and bounds.

While increased wages could result in higher prices for us on some items being imported from China, it could also help put the brakes on the red-hot Chinese economy and, in turn, slow down their demand for products like steel and oil. If this happened, the prices for those commodities on the world market would drop for us as well. Also, higher wages in China may discourage some US companies from setting up factories there. Of course, other slave-wage countries are out there that could try to fill the gap, but forcing China to raise its wages would be a good start on slowing the rapid erosion of American manufacturing jobs.