[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 80 (Tuesday, June 10, 1997)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1156-E1157]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




STATEMENT BY SANU MISHRA, BRATTLEBORO HIGH SCHOOL, REGARDING SWEATSHOP 
                                 LABOR

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. BERNARD SANDERS

                               of vermont

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, June 10, 1997

  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of my colleagues I would 
like to have printed in the Record this statement by a high school 
student from Brattleboro High School in Vermont, who was speaking at my 
recent town meeting on issues facing young people.

       Ms. Mishra: Good morning, Congressman Sanders. I have come 
     here today to speak about the issue of sweatshops.
       The dictionary defines a sweatshop as a factory where 
     workers work long hours for low wages under unwholesome 
     conditions. You know as well as I that this type of work 
     exists today and it is being used by many rich and famous 
     companies. I would like to focus on one particular company, 
     Disney, and its factories in Haiti.
       Disney exploits thousands of people in Haiti every day. It 
     hires the Haitian people to work in its sweatshops, paying 
     them only 28 cents an hours, requiring them to strive toward 
     fairly impossible quotas and keeping them from ever being 
     able to change their conditions.
       How much responsibility does a company like Disney have for 
     the wellbeing of its employees? According to the United 
     States government the responsibility is large. Corporate 
     codes of conduct guarantee the human rights of any person 
     working for a U.S. company be it in the U.S. or abroad.
       Trade benefits are given to Disney by the U.S. and Haiti on 
     the condition that there is respect for human rights, but 
     while Disney enjoys the tax exemptions, it doesn't live up to 
     its part of the bargain. 28 cents an hour is not a living 
     wage. Disney knows this, its manufacturers know this. While 
     it may indeed be the minimum wage in Haiti, we must ask 
     ourselves is it enough for a person to survive?
       If you believe as does Disney that it is not an essential, 
     that it is an essential part of everyday life to eat, that 
     education isn't important and that diseases such as malaria 
     and dysentery can be fought off without even medicines then 
     28 cents is more than enough. But if you would agree that 
     living on sugar water, going to bed hungry and being in 
     constant debt is unfair and not right, then you would side 
     with the Haitian workers.
       The average Haitian Disney employee after paying off all 
     her debts she possibly can comes home to her family with 
     little more than $3 in her pocket. Keep in mind that the

[[Page E1157]]

     cost of living in Haiti is just about the same as it is in 
     the U.S. Imagine having to survive on $3 a week, 44 cents a 
     day. 44 cents cannot buy a can of Campbell's soup, it cannot 
     buy the $2 used pair of shoes that one of your children is in 
     desperate need of.
       The Haitian workers are not being extravagant in their 
     requests, asking for a 30 cent pay raise from 28 to 58 cents 
     an hour. Right now the workers are receiving less than one 
     half of one percent in the total cost of the merchandise they 
     make, earning 7 cents for every $11.99 pair of Pocohontas 
     pajamas they sew. If granted their request they would be 
     earning 9 cents out of every $11.97 pair of pajamas they sew; 
     that is a two cent difference. This would still leave Disney, 
     the contractors and Walmart with over 99 percent of the 
     profit.
       Disney can afford to give a pay rise for its Haitian 
     workers. It pays its CEO, Michael Eisner over $10,000 an 
     hour; $10,000 compared to 28 cents. It would take a worker in 
     Haiti sewing Disney clothes 14 and a half years to earn what 
     Michael Eisner earns in one hour, and 29,000 years to earn 
     what he earns in one year.
       Finally, raising the wages of the Haitian workers would not 
     only be beneficial to the workers themselves but to U.S. 
     residents as well. A person earning 28 cents an hour who 
     cannot even afford to feed her own family cannot afford to 
     buy products made in the U.S.
       I urge you, Congressman Sanders to look into the dealings 
     of Disney in Haiti; I urge you to put pressure on companies 
     such as Disney to stop the use of sweatshops; I urge you to 
     get Disney to live up to its responsibilities as an employer. 
     The Haitian people deserve better.
       In the case of Disney I know that in Grand Rapids there is 
     a factory and Disney moved its company overseas and a lot of 
     people in Grand Rapids lost their jobs. They had been working 
     there for 20 years, as much as 20 years, and now they are 
     without jobs, working at McDonald's or whatever they can 
     find.
       The problem is so immense and when I was researching I 
     found that our tax money is going towards helping executives 
     and business people in Haiti continue these sweatshops and I 
     think that needs to be stopped. And I think that even though 
     we have laws, the corporate codes of conduct, et cetera, they 
     are not being followed, so we need people to watch out over 
     these companies because obviously these companies are not 
     doing it themselves.
       Citizens, consumers can watch what they are buying if they 
     see something made from Disney, look at where it is made, and 
     if it is made in Haiti you know these people are working for 
     so long and have such hard hours and they are not earning 
     anything. They do not even have enough food to eat. You have 
     to consider that. The clock is really nice, but do you really 
     want to support a sweatshop in Haiti?

     

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