Undercover in a Chinese iPhone Factory
How’s this for a summer project? NYU grad student Dejian Zeng spent six weeks last summer working in an iPhone factory near Shanghai. Zeng agreed to an interview with Business Insider’s Kif Leswing to describe his experience. There have been horror stories about conditions inside Chinese iPhone contract manufacturing factories, but outside of dorm life and the temporary nature of the work, Zeng’s experience will sound pretty familiar to anyone acquainted with American factory work.
This is a worthwhile read, with many details about worker training and security, Zeng's role on the assembly line, what he did and ate during breaks, motivations of the Chinese workers, and more, along with quotes from Apple PR about their view. The last bit of text brings the article into focus, saying "be aware that every day when you use your iPhone, just think that there are a lot of people working day and night to produce this kind of piece... there are human hands behind this."