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Official development blog for the PARANOIA roleplaying game. No description is available at your security clearance. The Computer is your friend.

Thursday, May 27, 2010

PARANOIA in the real world: Non-suicide oaths 

Singapore newspaper Today describes the way beleaguered Chinese electronics manufacturer Foxconn, which has endured 12 employee suicide attempts and ten deaths in the last five months, has redressed the problem: by requiring employees to sign oaths not to kill themselves:
Workers have reportedly been told to sign letters promising not to kill themselves and even agreeing to be sent to psychiatric institutions if they appear to be in an "abnormal mental or physical state for the protection of myself and others." [...]

But workers spoke of long hours, harsh supervisors and low pay. A 21-year-old employee from Guangxi province said she worked 12 hours a day, six days a week. "The atmosphere inside our workplaces is so stifling and depressing that we're not allowed to speak to each other for 12 hours or you'll be reproached by your supervisors."

But there was no shortage of people trying to get through the factory gates, with about 8,000 job applicants every day during the hiring season.
Foxconn's Shenzhen factory has 330,000 workers, so its suicide rate this year is in line with China's reported suicide rate of 13.9 per 100,000 (1999 figures) -- which, itself, isn't grossly higher than the US suicide rate of 11.1 per 100,000 (2005 figures). Maybe the non-suicide oath should be a checkbox on each year's tax return.
Posted by: Allen Varney / 4:19 PM

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