Amidst reports of forced or quasi-forced overtime and other abuses, Foxconn says it’s going to cut back on how many hours it asks people to put in but less overtime also means lower incomes:
“We are here to work and not to play, so our income is very important,” said Chen Yamei, 25, a Foxconn worker from Hunan who said she had worked at the factory for four years.
“We have just been told that we can only work a maximum of 36 hours a month of overtime. I tell you, a lot of us are unhappy with this. We think that 60 hours of overtime a month would be reasonable and that 36 hours would be too little,” she added. Chen said she now earned a bit over 4,000 yuan a month ($634).
Foxconn says that wages are going to be raised enough to hold workers’ incomes steady, but workers aren’t so sure.
