1000 Chinese Workers Stage Revolt Over 2 Minute Bathroom Breaks
If we as a nation, buoyed by Obama's Inauguration preach, expect to compete once again on a global jobs stage (as we noted earlier) then perhaps taking a note from the Chinese employers' handbook will wake a few up to new realities. CTV News reports the Chinese workers are revolting as they demand "the scrapping of the ridiculously strict requirements stipulating that workers only have two minutes to go to the toilet and workers will be fined 50 yuan ($8) if they are late once and fired if they are late twice." Hundreds of Chinese factory orders angry at these policies took labor law into their own hands and held their Japanese and Chinese managers hostage for a day and a half before police broke up the strike. Shanghai Shinmei Electric noted the managers were released unharmed after 300 police officers were called to the factory. As CTV notes, strikes have become more commonplace in China, as factories operating in highly competitive markets try to get more productivity from their labor force; but workers connected by mobile phones and the Internet become more aware of their rights.
Via CTV News:
BEIJING — Hundreds of Chinese factory workers angry about strictly timed bathroom breaks and fines for starting work late held their Japanese and Chinese managers hostage for a day and a half before police broke up the strike.
About 1,000 workers at Shanghai Shinmei Electric Company held the 10 Japanese nationals and eight Chinese managers inside the factory in Shanghai starting Friday morning until 11.50 p.m. Saturday, said a statement from the parent company, Shinmei Electric Co., released Monday. It said the managers were released uninjured after 300 police officers were called to the factory.
A security guard at the Shanghai plant said Tuesday that workers had gone on strike to protest the company's issuing of new work rules, including time limits on bathroom breaks and fines for being late.
"The workers demanded the scrapping of the ridiculously strict requirements stipulating that workers only have two minutes to go to the toilet and workers will be fined 50 yuan ($8) if they are late once and fired if they are late twice," said the security guard, surnamed Feng. "The managers were later freed when police intervened and when they agreed to reconsider the rules."
The plant makes electromagnetic coils and other electronic products. It was closed Tuesday, said a man who answered at the plant but refused to identify himself. He said no workers were on strike and staff would return to work on Wednesday.
Strikes have become commonplace in China, as factories operating in highly competitive markets try to get more productivity from their labor force and workers connected by mobile phones and the Internet become more aware of their rights.
Shinmei Electric's statement didn't say specifically what the workers were protesting, but said management reforms and labor policies were believed to be a cause. It said talks were under way with workers at the plant and that police were questioning staff.
A man who refused to give his name from the press office of the Shanghai police bureau said he had no information about the incident and referred calls to the Shanghai government press office, where calls rang unanswered.
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Minding their Pee's & Q's...
... or pee's and queues?
(The early bird gets the worm; the second mouse gets the cheese!)
Need moar fiber.
I use a similar product, it's called "Hu Flung Pu".
2 minutes?? Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "dropping a deuce".
It takes me more than 2 minutes to just set up shop. Those poor bastiges.
No wonder anon is so pissed all the time!
pods
They must have decent toilets if they want to spend more than two minutes in there taking a dump.
Here in America our port a potties are cleaned at irregular intervals and are full of south of the border hepatitis and other bonus materials shipped north through our porous borders.
Taking a dump in America on a job site is a act of courage and daring desperation these days.
They need to get back to work, I need my cheap walmart crap in exchange for fake money
Gotta love their free unregulated labor markets- a Libertarian
Handing out depends is probably uneconomical. Can't they just put a trough by the production line? Maybe change their diet to something with no fiber. Colostomy bags?
Just thinking outside the box here. We need to get the net up by 2% next quarter.
The two minute limit would be reasonable, if you gaurantee that every worker is, at all times, within 10 seconds of an unoccupied toilet. The problem is, in any large factory or call center, it can easily take a minute each way just to get to the toilet.
You're forgetting for the moment that slaves have no rights.
If you want to see America's future, look to China as the example.
It's not so much a matter of rights but the raw power of Labor acting in unity.
china knows how to run their slave population.
.
They're angry because there are no clear unshatupon spots on the roadside within one minute's walking distance.
Production was starting to lag
The breaks were becoming a drag
Some Kleptos surmised
Production would rise
If workers shit into a bag
Five-star post, LK. I often wonder if you think in meter...
Only when I'm awake. ;-)
More incentive to do it quickly when you are using a "squatter". One needs good calf muscles for longer times. Maybe the Japanese are no so well endowed int he calf area and make the same assumption for the Chinese.
Add three more to figuring out what you're gonna read on the john, five to ten minutes to go, one more to wipe, one more to wash your hands, five more to chat with your colleagues, and two more to settle back into work and we're looking at a 15-20 minute deal here!
Poor girls... hope those robot managers let them have a proper bathroom break. :(
Had to login just to up arrow that comment. Priceless!
I need more than 2 minutes to drive over to Geithner's house and shit in his mailbox
Chinese workers have no time for a Geithner poop. Need more Obama poops, pleeze.
Someone forgot to put the new cover sheet on their TPS report.
I'd like to read about this, but gotta take a piss...
Too much Chinese tea...
USA really needs to take this page from the Chinese worker supervision playbook.
American workers need some good Chinese discipline.
Wow, even the Obama/Boehner blow jobs take longer than 2 minutes.
So much for the dictatorship of the proletariat.
I guess a complete workers’ paradise has not yet been fully realized.
Silly Chinese communists. Obama would never dream of micromanaging Americans’ lives to the point where bathroom breaks (using eco-flush toilets with crappy, poisonous light bulbs of course) were legally limited to two minutes would he?
Ha - it takes the average American two minutes just to get their pants zipped.
global slavery has arrived! (no retirement, pay barely covers necessities, elite ruling class, clamp down on workers more and more)
must be why hacking up schoolyards is a weekly occurrence over there.
How could anyone not snap?
I believe this is called progress.
Meanwhile back in the USSA...
Blockbuster closing 300 stores, expected to layoff 3000 people.
http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Latest-News-Wires/2013/0122/Blockbuste...
Just GREAT! How the hell am I supposed to check shit out before I order it online?
One magic word: torrent.
Recently got a google nexus 7 and a few reading apps for epub/pdf/etc - great for [fre]ebooks.
www.rottentomatoes.com
+1 The other day I got scowled at by a few of the comparative literature graduates now turned Barnes and Noble employees for adding books I saw in store to my amazon wishlist via my phone. Sorry but inflation's a bitch on my paychecks, blame Ben, not me.
swirling the drain BustedBlock,
still suckling as it goes down tho' - more desk jockeys until there isn't.
Heh. You win for one of the least coherent gibes I've seen in awhile.
Maybe them commies should UNIONIZE, eh?
Hey, I'm gonna take 30 min for my morning glory no matter what the law says. Just come on in and arrest me (enter at your own risk of course).
a thousand people in China is like ten people over here in America, their cries will fall on deaf ears...OR they will never be seen from again the next day.
A tree fell in the forest.
But there was no one to hear.
What no pisscans at the workstations?
Hell ~ it takes me at least 3 minutes to properly pinch a log...
You take too rong to pinch rog. Good worker, he pinch roaf in ereven seconds FRAT.
I think you're overstated calling your manhood a "log"
(oh...)
Hung Lo.
It takes me 2 minutes to bend a biscuit thanks to my flax and hemp seed w/ black coffee regimine every morning.