Through worker interviews and surveys the report uncovers a litany of workers’ rights abuses, including the widespread suppression of the human right to join or form a trade union by means of harassment, bribes, the failure to renew short-term contracts and even factory closure.
Not one of the 83 factories surveyed is reported to pay a living wage, and workers in the Philippines explain that they were so destitute by the months’ end they had no choice but to pawn their ATM cards in exchange for loans. Some factories are found to deny workers the legal minimum wage, while others link the payment of basic wages to unachievable production targets which workers struggle desperately to meet.
