Worker wages, how much?

[Ingo]

@loseyourself

They help 90 people? That’s it?

I have to say, I’m surprised. When I read the 6200 number I expected them to actually help… 6200 people.

Well, they do help 6200 people. That number is from the 2023 impact report

we have paid out $950,000 as living wage bonuses to about 6,200 factory workers at suppliers and sub-suppliers.

That means, this is the number of people added up over multiple years and multiple factories. And it includes all workers in the factories, because the per device bonus after calculation is paid to everyone, not just the workers that actually worked on Fairphones.

The 88 of workers on the production line is from a guide to be used by other companies where the calculation of the per device bonus is illustrated which uses only the workers that actually produce for the company (maybe just for a single factory?). I’m quite sure that calculations therein don’t span several years. And it uses FTE and not the number of individual people (somebody did mention turnover earlier).

That guide being from July 2022 also makes me think that this example might not even use the actual Faiphone data. 15,000 phones per month would mean 180,000 phones per year, while the company only sold close to 90,000 in 2021 and 116,000 phones in 2022 (which couldn’t be known at the time of publishing) and the goal for 2023 is 170,000. 15k devices might just be an arbitrary number for ease of calculation.

[Ingo]

@rodler

Well Ingo, I guess the only thing that really matters is whether or not it fits
your own definition of a living wage, so I won’t tell you what to believe.

After that reply I believe you are a troll.

[yvmuell]

Overall your writing style seems quite agressive to me and to me it seems you “had something specific in mind” when starting it. So whats the point you want to address?

[AnotherElk]

@rodler

Well Ingo, I guess the only thing that really matters is whether or not it fits
your own definition of a living wage

No. Facts matter, and a general consensus on how to ascertain them matters, so that there can be a fruitful discussion about things instead of just slapping each each other with some stuff everybody made up themselves.

The question stands …

@rodler

Personally, that is not how I have heard the term
“living wage” defined

How have you heard it defined?

@rodler

so I won’t tell you what to believe.

Nobody asked you for what to believe.

[yvmuell]

Seems we might be playing “Taubenschach” with a sealion while the tactics have room for improvement in terms of politiness…

[rodler]

@Ingo

@rodler

Well Ingo, I guess the only thing that really matters is whether or not it fits
your own definition of a living wage, so I won’t tell you what to believe.

After that reply I believe you are a troll.

Cool, and I think people who claim to “ask questions out of curiosity” are just
trying to push a point without clearly saying what is the point they are trying to
push. thanks for the discussion.

[rodler]

@yvmuell

Seems we might be playing “Taubenschach” with a sealion while the tactics have room for improvement in terms of politiness…

No idea what you said, what I do know is that if this discussion is bothering some people to the point that they feel the need to launch personal attacks on me, ce la vie.

[Ganth]

tl;dr: Hi, it seems to me we’re getting distracted by our differing world-views and life-experiences. Reality is messy, and attempts to simplify things to just a few numbers don’t always work. There is no strong evidence Fairphone isn’t honest. The extra details I give in this post prove it I think.

I’d like to add a few details and close my participation in this discussion, where I my curiosity was more than answered.

@rodler

“wageindictator.org” seems to require email verification just to check that info which is really suspicious

I had an edit to my last message which got lost: Yes, this foundation is indeed not that transparent and accessible. When you see which companies they’re funded by, their independance can be questionned.

So even if it’s a bit tedious for China as the site is in chinese, you can get data from them. It gives for Shangai:

However in their article, fairphone cites another organisation, and they seem much more serious, and at least their base data seems accessible: China Archives - Global Living Wage Coalition.
Here the Shangai wage seems much higher, but this could be due to other complicated reasons.

So even if there are still a few questions, to me living wage is defined properly and we have usable numbers.

@Ganth

From my research above we can see they employ about 90 full time workers at a time, and the $950000 where spread over 5 years.

I had already spent too much time and took a shortcut making too many assumption here.
Thanks @Ingo for bringing in a bit more nuance. Indeed, now you mention it, it does seem like a speculative case in the living wage guide.

@loseyourself

They help 90 people? That’s it?

Even if there were only ~90 full time people simultaneously assembling the fairphone devices, that’s just the assembly line, not the whole supply chain. I believe you can reach much higher numbers when counting all the compounded positive impact. So I don’t think it’s just ~90.

However, this part of the article:

Since 2019, Fairphone has supported over 6,200 people working in five factories of suppliers and sub-suppliers with US$950.000 in living wage bonuses. On average, that means a month of extra salary per year for every worker we impacted.

stirs the reader into believing 6200 workers earned a month of extra salary/year with $950000. Which can’t be the case, as this amount of money means the total average benefit was only $150/worker all years added up (instead of each month, if we take their $15 → $21/day number). So there is progress to be made in communication.
(I do believe the 6200 number is representative though, and trust that we are just seing the result of approximations and phrasing ‒i.e. communication‒ mistakes)

Keep in mind it’s just a blog article, not a more serious report like their impact report as @Ingo said.

On a side note, I as well believe in “better than nothing” philosophy: as a result of their ethical work, fairphones are 2-3 times more expensive than similar competing phones, and in 2023 they had difficulties and were far from reaching their sales objectives:

Keep in mind they do have to survive, and that most people don’t at all go in depth understanding all the details, they just look at the “frontpage numbers”. I’m ready to tolerate some communication approximations if it can allow them to keep going.

Let me add that I don’t have any money in fairphone, and will move elsewhere if they disappear. But we’d lose a positive player in the electronics market in my opinion, and this is why I think they at least deserve a fair (haha) judgement.

@Ingo

After that reply I believe you are a troll.

Finally, I believe this is false.
In my opinion, you just could have done better at balancing your judgement in this discussion @rodler
This is why I’m now leaving it, I just don’t have the time anymore. Thanks for raising the topic though.

[Ingo]

@Ganth

@Ingo

After that reply I believe you are a troll.

Finally, I believe this is false.

From the outside, no one will ever know if people come here with the intention to stir the pot or if their natural way of communication just looks like it.

IMHO rodler was playing the disinformation 101 pretty well, if on purpose on by accident I can’t say. Ultimately, to me it doesn’t matter. Inacceptable behaviour is inacceptable behaviour, even more so when continued while others try to clear up potential misunderstandings.

@rodler

Personally, that is not how I have heard the term
“living wage” defined and I think it’s irresponsible to hijack the term (for marketing purposes) for a wage which doesn’t actually fit the definition

He says, Fairphone’s use of “living wage” is wrong, says there is a definition but refuses to explain it or simply link to it. Instead he hides behind the words “how I have heard” which always leaves the option to blame some 3rd party in case someone disagrees. And by not telling us what he means he leaves us on thin ice where we have to either make assumptions (and asking nicely if they are correct BTW) that are then followed by the typical

@rodler

Well sure, go ahead and put words in my mouth and act like I said something I never did.

or we simply ask him to be more specific to avoid making assumptions and that is just sidetracked with complete nonsense like

@rodler

Well Ingo, I guess the only thing that really matters is whether or not it fits
your own definition of a living wage, so I won’t tell you what to believe.

In analogy to the “If it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck” (see Duck typing) I say “If it talks like a troll and reacts like a troll, then to me it is a troll”.

[rodler]

It’s funny how the person here screaming “troll” is the only person here who is choosing to stay down in the gutter and launch personal attacks rather than contribute anything of value to this discussion.

@Ingo

In analogy to the “If it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck” (see Duck typing) I say “If it talks like a troll and reacts like a troll, then to me it is a troll”.

I agree 100 percent.