Almost everybody here focuses on Apple instead on the Wistron. Having said that I am more inclined that the fault lies on the local managements and myriad of subcontracting companies or even third-party payroll and HR systems.
Apple probably audits their suppliers and contractors better than almost all of their peers but they are also culpable here for creating the ingredients for workers to be treated like shit by their pseudo-contractors. This isn't some widget factory that Apple signed on to make iPhones for the near future, it's a factory that only exists in the first place to make Apple iPhones and Apple fronted all the money to build it, etc. But Apple has set it up in a way that artificially distances themselves from what should be Apple employees (or at worst employees of a joint venture where Apple execs could run the HR and avoid these shady labor violations). I'm sure there are many benefits in doing it this way and they are lauded for those every quarter so they are also going to take the lumps as well.
It’s kind of hard to know what is going on from an outsiders perspective. Maybe Apple could have or should have known about this before, maybe they did already know, maybe they did everything they realistically could and were deceived.
One thing is certain, this problem isn’t specific to Apple. The whole electronics manufacturing industry is rotten and the only ones capable of fixing it are the governments of these counties. Wistron should be crushed for this wage theft and serve as a warning for other companies.
If it is anything like the Cable TV Industry, Apple absolutely knows and is in on the game.
I've noticed a pattern where large companies use a -lot- of contractors, sometimes under many layers. When I worked in Telecom, we were usually the contractor for Comcast, but sometimes there was another contractor above us and we were the 'sub-contractor'.
But then, below us, were often 1 or 2 more layers of subcontractors.
1/3 of the time we had decent contractors and scope of work and everything worked out. The other 2/3 of the time, it would be one or more of the following:
- The contractor mis-bid the project in a way that would lead them to go bankrupt in a year or two
- The contractor did a cut-rate job to maximize their profits.
- The deadlines or work rate were unreasonable and led to mistakes.
But, the important thing about all of this, is that the number of layers involved in the transaction lets everyone point the finger at each other and never point out that maybe it's the system itself that is broken.
The fault lies with decisions taken by Wistron [local] management, but the incentives to ensure similar decisions aren't taken in future depend on decisions taken by Apple.
> Almost everybody here focuses on Apple instead on the Wistron.
Yeah... because how fucking stupid would someone have to be to work at one of the world's largest, most valuable companies and expect anyone in their right mind to believe them when they throw up their hands and say, "Oh my God guys, we had nOoOoOoOo ideeeea this was happening!"
