Labor

U.S. lawmakers acknowledge horrendous work conditions in China and are pushing for better labor standards in foreign countries.

A labor organizer who’s helped workers write legal petitions for compensation in China was hacked from head to foot by two men wielding meat cleavers. He remains in critical condition at a hospital.

Loretta Tofani spent fourteen months in China researching working conditions in Chinese factories. She details her investigation and the risks some Chinese workers face in the manufacturing sector.

When Nicaraguan workers won the case against Dole Food Co., Chinese lawyers were inspired to act, gathering up plaintiffs to hold U.S. companies liable for their failure to assess workers' safety.

Pulitzer Center grantee Loretta Tofani talked to KCRW's To The Point about occupational diseases Chinese factory workers suffer to produce cheap goods to export to foreign countries including the U.S.

U.S. companies say they’re not to be blamed for importing from Chinese factories with sub-par work conditions; it's up to China to figure out how to protect their own workers.

For years, Chinese workers making nickel-cadmium batteries for U.S. distributors such as Eveready and Energizer complain of sickness, not realizing that cadmium can lead to kidney failure and death.

Exposure to chemicals in paint and varnish has claimed lives of Chinese workers who produce furniture for major U.S. companies like Restoration Hardware, Ethan Allen Furniture and Haverty Furniture.

Throughout China, workers making goods for export use outdated—sometimes jerry-rigged—machines that lack safety features standard in the U.S., causing workers to lose legs, arms, hands or fingers.

Workers producing Char-Broil stoves in China were given only thin gauze masks that do nothing to prevent metal dust from entering their lungs. Many end up contracting lung diseases like silicosis.

Most American businesses that import from China are small and medium-sized. Many have never visited the factories, and are unaware of any dangerous working conditions surrounding their products.

Over a 12-month period, Pulitzer Center grantee Loretta Tofani visited more than 25 factories in China to document the risks Chinese workers go through to supply American consumers with cheap goods.