Hanes is stealing from some of the world's poorest workers

[JohnyCanuck]

Giant clothing brand Hanes has been caught stealing from some of the poorest workers in the world, and we've got less than a week to stop it.


Haiti has become an apparel-producing powerhouse as global clothing brands like Hanes move factories there to take advantage of some of the lowest wages in the western hemisphere. But workers aren't benefiting from the boom -- a new report from our friends at the Worker Rights Consortium has revealed that every single export garment factory in Haiti has been paying workers less than the minimum wage. And as a result, three quarters of Haitian garment workers don’t make enough to afford three full meals a day.

At the end of this week, Russell and Gildan, two of Hanes’s top competitors, are meeting with labor rights advocates and representatives from Haitian unions to make plans to pay workers what they're owed. But Hanes has refused to join them. That means we need to speak out now and let Hanes know that consumers will hold it accountable if it tries to ignore the workers making its clothes.

Tell Hanes to stop stealing from the poor: End wage theft at your Haitian suppliers.

This isn't the first time Hanes has been in the public eye for trying to keep Haitian workers in poverty. Two years ago, WikiLeaks revealed that the company furiously lobbied the U.S. State Department to stop the Caribbean nation from raising its minimum wage to just $5 a day. Even after the garment industry got special carve-outs from the minimum wage, Hanes and its suppliers continued to mercilessly exploit its Haitian workforce.


You can sign a petition at:
http://action.sumofus.org/a/haiti-hanes/?akid=3415.1399456.R54AQ-&rd=1&sub=fwd&t=2

Group Says Haitian Garment Workers Are Shortchanged on Pay

MEXICO CITY — Garment factories in Haiti, the backbone of an effort to revive the country’s earthquake-shattered economy, have seriously shortchanged workers of their wages to keep costs of their T-shirts and other export goods low, according to a report to be issued Wednesday by a labor rights group.
World Twitter Logo.

The report, prepared by the Worker Rights Consortium, focused on 5 of Haiti’s 24 garment factories and found that “the majority of Haitian garment workers are being denied nearly a third of the wages they are legally due as a result of the factories’ theft of their income.”

The group said that the factories deprive workers of higher wages they are entitled to under law by setting difficult-to-meet production quotas and neglecting to pay overtime.

It said that offenders included the Caracol Industrial Park in northern Haiti, which the United States helped build and has cited as a centerpiece of reconstruction efforts, and factories that make products for prominent retailers like Gap, Target and Walmart.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/16/world/americas/group-says-haitian-garment-workers-are-shortchanged-on-pay.html?_r=1&

[lamp_shade]

1. Done.

[840high]

2. will do

[TeamPooka]

3. K&R! Done

[TeamPooka]

4. Folks might want to Twitter shame athlete Michael Jordan about this since he is the face of Hanes

in all their ads.

[pinboy3niner]

5. As ye sew, so shall ye reap. Done. nt

[NastyRiffraff]

6. Done and K&R

Thanks for posting. This is important.

[JohnyCanuck]

7. Thanks for signing and the K&R n/t

[Agony]

8. Signed and forwarded to my list

checked the "I am a Hanes customer" box...

[OnyxCollie]

9. Look at who contributed to this mess:

Our "inevitable" Democratic candidate for 2016, Hillary Clinton.

The Clinton Foundation - About
http://www.clintonfoundation.org/main/our-work/by-initiative/clinton-foundation-in-haiti/about.html

The Clinton Foundation has been actively engaged in Haiti since 2009, focusing on economic diversification, private sector investment and job creation in order to create long-term, sustainable economic development. After the devastating earthquake in 2010, President Clinton formed the Clinton Foundation Haiti Fund and raised $16.4 million from individual donors for immediate earthquake relief efforts. Since 2010, the Clinton Foundation has raised a total of $34 million for Haiti, including relief funds as well as projects focused on restoring Haiti's communities, sustainable development, education and capacity building. In 2012, the Clinton Foundation concentrated on creating sustainable economic growth in the four priority sectors of energy, tourism, agriculture, and apparel/manufacturing, working to bring new investors, develop and support local organizations and businesses, and create access to new markets. The Clinton Foundation also continued working to support government efforts to improve Haiti’s business environment and supported programs in education and capacity building.

Washington Backed Famous Brand-Name Contractors in Fight Against Haiti’s Minimum Wage Increase
http://www.haiti-liberte.com/archives/volume4-47/Washington%20Backed%20Famous.asp

The U.S. Embassy in Haiti worked closely with factory owners contracted by Levi’s, Hanes, and Fruit of the Loom to aggressively block a paltry minimum wage increase for Haitian assembly zone workers, the lowest paid in the hemisphere, according to secret State Department cables.

The factory owners refused to pay 62 cents an hour, or $5 per eight-hour day, as a measure unanimously passed by the Haitian parliament in June 2009 would have mandated. Behind the scenes, the factory owners had the vigorous backing of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the U.S. Embassy, show secret U.S. Embassy cables provided to Haïti Liberté by the transparency-advocacy group WikiLeaks.

The minimum daily wage had been 70 gourdes or $1.75 a day.

The factory owners told the Haitian parliament that they were willing to give workers a mere 9 cents an hour pay increase to 31 cents an hour – 100 gourdes daily – to make T-shirts, bras and underwear for U.S. clothing giants like Dockers and Nautica.

Report: State Department-Backed Garment Complex in Haiti Stealing Workers’ Wages
http://www.democracynow.org/2013/10/17/headlines#10179

A new report by the Worker Rights Consortium has found the majority of workers in Haiti’s garment industry are being denied nearly a third of the wages they are legally owed due to widespread wage theft. The new evidence builds on an earlier report that found every single one of Haiti’s export garment factories was illegally shortchanging workers. Workers in Haiti make clothes for U.S. retailers including Gap, Target, Kohl’s, Levi’s and Wal-Mart. The report highlighted abuses at the Caracol Industrial Park, a new factory complex heavily subsidized by the U.S. State Department, the Inter-American Development Bank and the Clinton Foundation and touted as a key part of Haiti’s post-earthquake recovery. The report found that, on average, workers at the complex are paid 34 percent less than the law requires. Haiti’s minimum wage for garment workers is between 60 and 90 cents an hour. More than three-quarters of workers interviewed for the report said they could not afford three meals a day.

[Lunacee_2013]

10. Great...

Can't even buy underwear without taking advantage of poor people. Do any corporations care about their workers?

[JohnyCanuck]

11. Care about maximizing profits usually has pride of place over everything else n/t

[Wilms]

12. ^

[johnnyreb]

13. Monday kick.

[CTyankee]

14. OMG, I just got a shipment from Hanes...

I had such good luck with the warm pants and sweatshirt I ordered a while back that I ordered more just recently. They are very well made, don't shrink and were incredibly inexpensive. Now I feel like a schmuck...

So I signed the petition and checked the box that said "I am a Hanes customer." I'm glad that box was added.