The true price of cheap computers

I was shocked to read this article in Computer Weekly about the conditions that Chinese workers have to endure so that we can buy cheaper computing equipment. The article is actually about a report from an organisation called The National Labour Committee that investigated the factory recently.
The image above is from their site (used with permission via email).

The article reveals that in one factory in China that makes equipment for Microsoft, Dell, HP, IBM and Lenovo the workers are only paid $0.61 an hour (that's 42p an hour).

As if that wasn't bad enough, the workers live in the factory compound and only get a half hour off for dinner and a half hour off for lunch in their 12 hour shifts. I can't say that I'd enjoy working the 75 hour week that they routinely endure.

I think we've all heard the comment that factory workers in China only get paid "a bowl of rice a day" but in real terms these poor people are getting paid £5.04 a day. And they get £1.68 of that taken from them for food and board leaving £3.36 a day. They are often not paid for the work they have done - robbing them of between 14% and 19% of their rightful earnings.

I am deeply troubled that in these current times when China's government is making moves to join the world community and advance as a nation, it is still allowing its factory owners to commit deplorable acts of inhumane suffering.