07-06-2010 ABC news: 70% wage increase for workers at Foxconn, supplying Apple, Dell and HP

Excerpt from the ABC website:

Less than a week after announcing a 30 percent pay raise for its workers, electronics giant Foxconn said it will hike wages by another 66 percent beginning in October.

The company said it hoped the pay raise would help increase the incomes of its employees and enable them to reduce overtime work and have enough time for leisure activities. Terry Gou, the Taiwanese founder of Foxconn, said in a statement the wage increase was intended "to safeguard the dignity of workers."

...

And now Foxconn announced a whopping 70 percent pay rise after a spate of worker suicides raised questions about working conditions at the factory and threatened to harm the company's reputation.

Starting October 1, the salary of its assembly workers will increase to 2,000 yuan ($290) a month, compared to 900 yuan ($130) last month and 1,200 yuan ($175) following the first increase announced this month. It's the second pay hike announced in the past two weeks and is designed to offset criticism of the low salaries of its Chinese workers, which labor activists claim gave them no choice but to work more and more overtime.

*** Procure IT Fair has received word that there are concerns about the details of this wage increase. It is unclear to whom they would apply, when the increase would come into effect, and no negotiations between workers and management seems to have taken place. While the news item itself can be considered positive, and would therefore constitute a "green thumb", Procure IT Fair has decided to evaluate this message "neutral" because of these concerns.