Category Archives: China

Made In China

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China Offers To Sell Jobs To The U.S.
Will Loan Us The Money To Buy Them 

 Can Americans make their own iPads?

Richieville News Service – BEIJING

Faced with a growing labor shortage that has left employers struggling to fill positions, the Chinese Ministry of Finance today announced plans to sell some of the country’s extra jobs to the United States.  
“We feel kind of dumb,” said Zhu XiaoMin, an analyst for the Bank of China. “It turns out we took too many jobs from the U.S.  But it’s hard to keep track when your economy is growing at over 10 percent a year. Anyway, we thought maybe you guys would like some of them back, with your economy in the toilet and all. That way you Americans can make your own stuff again, like you used to. We’ll start you off on something simple, like plastic toys, and you can work up to harder things like  photo voltaic solar panels and bullet trains.” 
Mr. Zhu admitted that the new Chinese jobs would only pay about a dollar an hour and so  would probably be taken by illegal immigrants from Latin America. “That’s why you sent the jobs to us in the first place,” he commented. “You decided you’d rather have cheap tube socks than a high standard of living. Not that I’m criticizing or anything.” He said Chinese economists were still searching for a way around this problem. 

“It seems to us that you guys would be better off if you had some sort of national industrial policy and your economy was based on, you know, creating wealth, rather than just thinking up new ways to push money around,” Mr. Zhu explained. “But, hey, what do we know?  At least your hedge fund managers are doing really well.”

Chinese analysts said that the jobs would be sold under very reasonable terms and that the U.S. government could finance the purchase of the jobs by issuing new bonds which would, in turn, be bought by the Chinese government, an arrangement Mr. Zhu described as a “win-win.”
Many of the details of the plan remain to be worked out, but the Chinese seemed confident that it would be a success. “And if for some reason it doesn’t work out,” Mr. Zhu concluded, “no worries – you can just send the jobs back to us. We know what to do with them.”

For more Richieville humor, read the comic sci-fi novel, Rate Me Red.

There’s An App For That

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New iPhone App Will Help Chinese 
Workers Realize Apple Is Cool

Richieville News Service – CUPPERTINO
Programmers at Apple Computer today proudly unveiled a new program for the Apple iPhone and iPad, one they said was designed to address the needs of workers in Chinese factories that make those products. The application, or “Appleapp,” is a combination ebook, online multi-player game, and animated music video that takes advantage of the devices’ unique touch screen and motion-sensing capabilities. 
“We wanted to bring the true excitement of Apple to the assembly line workers who produce our ground-breaking iPhones and iPads,” said John Podsnap, a company spokesman. “After all, these guys live on the factory grounds where they work six or seven days a week so they probably don’t have time to visit an Apple retail store. This app will help them appreciate just how cool Apple is.” ”  

Apple’s manufacturing system has come under some scrutiny lately with reports that over a dozen workers at factories in Shenzen, China have committed suicide since the start of the year. The workers died at plants run by Foxconn, a Taiwan-based manufacturer who also produces equipment for Dell, HP and other U.S. companies. Responding to the reports, Steve Jobs, Apple’s legendary CEO, insisted that Foxconn factories were not, “sweatshops,” and that the company’s plants were, “pretty nice,” with, “restaurants, movie theaters, hospitals and swimming pools.”

“Yes, Foxconn factories are kind of like Club Med,” elaborated Mr. Podsnap. “Except instead of snorkeling, wind surfing and sunbathing, you work on an assembly line 12 hours a day for about a dollar an hour.”
Mr. Podsnap pointed out that since the news of the suicides had spread, Foxconn had doubled wages, to about $300 a month, although he admitted it might have been a better idea to raise wages before workers started throwing themselves from the tops of Foxconn’s buildings. The Apple spokesperson said the company had high hopes that the new app would help the Chinese employees feel better about their role in the manufacture of  Apple’s “revolutionary” products. 
“The new app will be available free of charge on the iPhone App Store,” Mr. Podsnap told reporters. “It’s very cool and I think they’ll really enjoy it. Now all they have to do is make enough to be able to afford an iPhone.”

For more Richieville humor, read the comic sci-fi novel, Rate Me Red.