DISNEY'S FANTASY BECOMES A NIGHTMARE
(Labor Notes n. 215 - February 1997)
Workers in China, Indonesia, Burma, and Haiti are employed by subcontractors to make clothing and toys featuring familiar Disney characters. However, the fantasy images reproduced on the merchandise are produced under far less magical conditions.
On December 17, an NBC Dateline undercover investigation exposed Disney's use of substandard wages, abusive working conditions and child labor. The report discovered the average employees making Disney merchandise are teenage girls, usually around the age of 15. Some of these teenage workers live in dormitories with 16 workers sharing a single room. No protective gear is provided for those who encounter toxic fumes and air polluted with dirt and lint. Work shifts under these conditions can last from 10 to 16 hours.
Dateline found that wages range from 10 to 25 cents an hour in China and Indonesia. Similarly the National Labor Committee (NLC) discovered that Disney's subcontractors in Haiti pay as little as 28 cents an hour, well below the subsistence level. Up to $1.60 of each day's earnings goes for transportation to work. Such low wages return only 5-7 cents to workers on products that retail for $12. Workers who produce Disney paraphernalia find themselves in chronic debt while Michael Eisner, the CEO of the Walt Disney Company, paid himself $97,600 per hour in 1993.
In Haiti workers are demanding at least $5 a day the right to collective bargaining, improved working conditions, and job security. The Disney/Haiti Justice Campaign and NLC are not asking Disney to withdraw from these countries. Rather they are pressuring the company to independently monitor international production and to end agreements with subcontractors who do not treat their workers fairly. The campaign is also calling for a boycott of Disney products made in Burma.
To support the campaign, write Michael Eisner, CEO Walt Disney Co. 500 South Buena Vista St., Burbank, CA 91522. NLC also suggests that groups ask for a meeting with Disney. For more information contact Maggie Poe, National Labor Committee, 275 7th Avenue, New York, NY 10001 or phone: 212/242-3002.
Information packets and videos are available.
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