Outsourcing Jobs = Outsourcing Pollution

I was talking with a visitor from China this past week about the beautiful weather we have been enjoying lately. She told me she sent a few pictures of Yale back to friends in China. The children that viewed the photos were amazed, not because of the centuries-old Gothic architecture, but because they had never seen a sky so blue.

Now, I was taken aback, because believe it or not, Yale is located in an urban area, and New Haven is considered a city. There are cars, buildings, construction, and streets. When I arrived last year, I remember complaining to my parents that the poor air quality of the city would cause me to develop some sort of respiratory disease. After all, for all of my life I have lived in nice suburban areas full of trees, blue skies, and sunshine.

Obviously, I had never experienced real pollution. This summer, I had a little taste of the air quality problem in China. The skies were always muggy, smoggy, and gray. First I thought it was just heavy cloud cover, until I realized there couldn't possibly be so many cloudy days during the summer months. It was true - if I peeked hard enough I could detect the hard bright glimmer of sunshine blocked by the layers and layers of pollution covering the sky.

The city pictured here isn't even that bad, believe it or not. This is Shenzhen and twenty-something years ago it was just a tiny fishing village. It has only suffered two decades worth of damage.

So my point is, we only see the bad side of companies moving their factories and jobs to countries like China. Yes, our manufacturing sector may be suffering and people may have to seek employment elsewhere, but the corporations are also taking their pollution and carbon emissions with them. By uprooting their factories, we do not have to deal with the immediate effects of smog and particulate matter.

My friend sees it this way: China is the factory of the United States. Chinese citizens may receive manufacturing jobs, but they also are paying indirectly because of the negative externalities. Respiratory diseases have become very common in cities. Buildings only a few years old look run-down and dirty from all the dirty residue from the air. It's another way to look at the debate over moving jobs and factories overseas. As the U.S. moves from being a manufacturing nation to one that provides services and technology, its environment and its citizens are benefiting.

Development

I know I mentioned before that China is really in a stage of rapid growth, but I did not realize the extent of this development.

There is literally construction and building everywhere. No matter where I turn, whether it is in a small town, a mountain, a highway, or a city, there is development. Malls are constructed, new apartment buildings are erected, roads are widened, mountain tunnels are blasted, and fields are overturned. It is crazy.

Not only does this mean an insane amount of traffic jams in an already crowded place, but it also means constant noise, dust, and pollution.

In the late 1950s, Mao Zedong wanted China to develop extremely quickly and catch up with the Soviet Union and the United States. This “Great Leap Forward,” in which China would “leap” over the normal stages of economic development, caused tens of millions of people to perish of starvation. Individual farmers were grouped together into communes to collectively plant and harvest crops. People melted all their household iron products such as pots to create material for industrial use. Figures for crop harvest were exaggerated by local Communist leaders in this frenzy for growth.

My grandmother described how she was extremely close to starving to death in one of the communes. People were given rations of food. Each person only received a handful of rice for a meal. My grandmother also had a young son, my oldest uncle, who she gave some of her portion.

Of course, this modern development is much better organized and planned out. It has helped a lot of people reach a never-before known standard of living. The new rising middle class has cars, TVs, appliances, and shopping and tourist destinations. More people have electricity, hot water, and jobs. However, that doesn’t mean the development doesn’t cause harm to many people.

A few days ago, on the highway I passed by this beautiful landscape. It was in the late afternoon, and the sun was just setting. Gorgeous terraced rice fields stretched out beneath the shadows of tall lush mountains. However, just beyond the border of the farmland was a huge smoke stack. It was pouring an immense black cloud that floated forebodingly above the peaceful countryside.

More people are also migrating from the rural areas into the growing cities. They usually receive jobs in construction or industrial labor. The city usually builds them some makeshift shelter to live in. Here is one such place right by my grandparents’ apartment. It is located underground.

Yes, they may earn a higher salary here in the urban areas, but the harsh labor coupled with lack of family and hours of overtime have driven some to desperate measures. Have you seen the recent news about the suicides at Foxcomm in Shenzhen, a corporation that supplies equipment to companies such as Apple?

I don’t know about you, but I think such a fast pace of change damages a country’s environment and the health, both mental and physical, of its people.

Labor

Because there are so many people in China, human labor is definitely affordable. There are far more people than jobs available and many are willing to do whatever it takes to earn a scant amount of money. Therefore, anything “made in China” is usually extremely cheap and most of the money goes to material and transportation costs rather than labor costs. I think this is usually true for most developing countries.

For example, my uncle hires two individual housekeepers. One only works part-time and is paid by the hour. She does not live with us. Her main chores include mopping the floors, cleaning, and doing laundry. I have not really interacted with her and it doesn’t appear that the other members of the household do either. She earns 12 Yuan or $2 an hour. I believe she also has to turnover some of this pay to the company that hires her.

The other housekeeper is more of a nanny. We called her Little Wang and I think she is in her fifties. She works here fulltime and actually has a little bed off the kitchen in small room that doubles as a laundry room. She takes cares of the little kids and does all the cooking and grocery shopping. She is paid 1800 Yuan a month plus room and board. That is about $10 a day.

Little Wang seems like a part of the family. We all converse with her and she is familiar with our habits and preferences. We try to convince her to eat with us at meals but she always insists on waiting until we are all done eating. The family treats her kindly, but at times with a little impatience because sometimes she is slow with chores. She loves to hear us talk about the United States.

Likewise, taxi drivers do not earn much either. Taking a taxi is actually pretty cheap in China. My grandmother and I rode a taxi for around twenty minutes and it cost 24 Yuan, or around $4. In New Haven this same trip might be $16 and tip. We talked with the driver for a little bit and he said in Shenzhen he is able to make more money than other cities, in the range of 5-6000 Yuan a month, or about $1000.

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In other news, we visited a cheap shopping district yesterday. Since it was Sunday, there were so many people! For lunch we ate at a quick noodle place.

Yum!

So tonight I leave Shenzhen to travel to Changsha. I'm not sure if I'll have regular internet access but I will try to post as often as possible, so keep reading!