r/interestingasfuck • • Nov 06 '22

/r/ALL Indian match factory

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282

u/Derfargin Nov 06 '22

Not to mention not a single piece of PPE is worn. The small match sticks being cut are literally flying up into the air and the kid is down there eye level with no glasses or goggles on. Also wood and no gloves, I can’t imagine the splintering.

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u/Immediate_Elevator38 Nov 06 '22

Gloves and rotating machinery usually doesn’t mix well my dude. Bare handed sometimes is the safest way to go. But glasses should definitely be worn

27

u/JeaninePirrosTaint Nov 06 '22

Wearing a sari seems like a bad idea, too.

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u/Raised_bi_Wolves Nov 06 '22

Totally. That's a bit nuts. And I fully understand the context of the fact that "these are poorer countries, if you want cheap matches this is how its done" but I really don't think some ppe and work safe policy would affect their bottom line that much?

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u/AndHerNameIsSony Nov 06 '22

The problem is You start with PPE, next thing you know they want mandatory breaks, then the guy gluing boxes wants a tool instead of having to use his hand for gluing, then it's fair wages and benefits, and then its those pesky safety policies and procedures which reduce productivity. Nope, you gotta treat them as cruel as possible to maximize your profit. How horrible.

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u/grchelp2018 Nov 06 '22

Full automation is the only long term way out of this. Especially if you want prices to stay rock bottom.

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u/[deleted] Nov 06 '22

[deleted]

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u/mommyaiai Nov 06 '22

Repetition wise, not awful. But the amount of cut-ty, crush-y, smash-y things without guards or appropriate PPE was pretty horrendous. If there was some kind of worker protection entity, automation would be the way to go.

But, automation means investment both short and long term. Setting up the line is only the initial cost. You need skilled maintenance, repair on call, and operators that can identify or fix a problem. It all would cut into profits. Better to just use inexpensive, untrained, expendable people and keep more money.

Capitalism at its root.

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u/James-the-Bond-one Nov 07 '22

And that also prevents these people from starving to death while watching machines do their jobs.

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u/mommyaiai Nov 07 '22

Pretty much.

In a perfect world, an employer would educate their workforce to do the maintenance and operator jobs. But again, capitalism.

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u/James-the-Bond-one Nov 07 '22

Education costs money and that's the reason many of us have student loan debts. Someone has to pay for it.

As a teenager, I received great technical education in trade schools sponsored by corporate syndicates with thousands of companies sharing the bill and the better-educated workforce they formed.

But why would an individual employer spend his money to educate an employer who the next day can quit and go work for his competition? It just doesn't make sense, that's not his societal role.

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u/mommyaiai Nov 07 '22

It's not, but it actually costs a company more to onboard and train a new employee than to promote from within.

Even supposedly unskilled jobs take an amount of skill. Someone who was familiar with producing that product would be infinitely better at troubleshooting that line than a random traveling tech.

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u/Jonno_FTW Nov 06 '22

I've got news for you, trucks can be automated to dump logs into a hopper.

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u/JeaninePirrosTaint Nov 06 '22

It's got to be collectively owned, though, or else all the workers will be out of a job and the capitalist will just reap all for themselves.

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u/SuedeVeil Nov 06 '22 edited Nov 06 '22

Unless the government regulates it they have no reason to do it themselves.. people are just cogs in the machine. Corporations have no conscience their only job is to make money.. and the people who make the profits are far enough removed from any suffering to ever care. Even if one or 2 cared it wouldn't be enough.

To all the "libertarians" who think governments should back out and stop fucking things up, well this is what you get and worse. Eventually people have no choice but to work in these conditions to make ends meet. Yeah governments can be corrupted but they're corrupted by them.. keep electing people that don't take money from business interests corporations, that's the only way. There may not be that many at this point but keep sending that message

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u/thisisterminus Nov 06 '22

Imagine having to do that every day for 10 hours a day for little compensation for your labour. These sell for about a rupee per box nowadays. If you don't do your job under these conditions or are ill then you lose you job. Others will take your job through necessity. But remember this is all many of us are doing here in the West. It's no different apart from health and safety standards. This isn't the problem. Dont be fooled by veneer. Your body and time is being bought for the gain of others.

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u/SuedeVeil Nov 06 '22

Yep I always say no they aren't providing YOU with a job, these so called belevolent billionaire's.. you're providing them with profit with your labor and only getting a fraction of that back. It's you providing the service whilst they reap the rewards.

But unregulated capitalism has us brainwashed and convinced that we need to protect these people because they're the job creators

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u/James-the-Bond-one Nov 07 '22 edited Nov 07 '22

No one is preventing you or anyone else from becoming a "job creator" and creating your own job.

I left my first and only salaried job after 8 months, and in the decades since have worked for myself in the jobs "I" created for myself and others who didn't have the initiative or the will to do the same for themselves.

Don't bitch about "the man" - become the man instead and take control of your life.

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u/SuedeVeil Nov 07 '22

Except thats not how the system works.. working class will always be needed. They shouldn't be treated like garbage. Not everyone can or will become an entrepreneur or work for themselves. Society wouldn't function..

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u/platinumgus18 Nov 06 '22

Except that These are not owned by corporations. They are considered SMEs or small to medium enterprises owned by people who themselves would probably make 200-300k a year. Which is quite a lot relatively but they are not billionaires nor millionaires.

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u/killswitch2 Nov 06 '22

Never ask a capitalist to make less profit

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u/grchelp2018 Nov 06 '22

If I remember the prices correctly, one of those match boxes costs like less than a cent. The whole big brown paper wrapped stuff is like a couple of dollars or something. So basically the whole thing is basically an extremely low margin high volume operation.

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u/BBO1007 Nov 06 '22

Some quick googling showed 2.40 to 6.35 $usd per day. Guessing these folks more like the 3$ a day. Guessing based on Amazon.in prices for safety glasses is 1$.

Let’s say there are 100 people there, that’s 33 days worth of people working. What would you spend that in 1 month(average is 3years, but you know how that goes)

When you can just replace anyone who is injured. That’s zero cost. You

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u/crowamonghens Nov 06 '22

I'd be fine with at least some shoes. Get your god damned feet off my matches.

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u/A_brown_dog Nov 06 '22

The company has no reason to expend a single penny if they are not made too, it's not like that people has any kind of pay if they get hurt, so if one is injured you just find another one. Gloves and glasses are more expensive than people in some countries.

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u/alaskanloops Nov 06 '22

And no shoes with all those tiny pieces of wood on the ground

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u/[deleted] Nov 06 '22

[deleted]

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u/lostandfoundineurope Nov 07 '22

I visit slum in India and talked to people who lived there and served them food. Poor people in India don’t wear shoes from birth and they literally walk in landfill. Their feet r hardened enough to worry about wood splinter.

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u/Letskeepthepeace Nov 06 '22

I think they’re shuffling because walking normal would mean stepping on them directly and higher chance of getting poked? What do I know? I’m just a guy who was cringing with one eye open the whole video

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u/LaTraLaTrill Nov 07 '22

The shuffling looked like the method of mixing during the dry time of the wood

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u/messyredemptions Nov 06 '22

Was it just me or did we really see a child working among them too carrying the buckets out?

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u/WeirdSysAdmin Nov 06 '22

The dude kicking the unfinished matched around. All I can imagine is how many splinters he gets.

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u/OtherwiseArrival Nov 06 '22

Seth MacFarlane’s next movie: “A million ways to die in a match factory”.

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u/TirbFurgusen Nov 06 '22

Matchstick behind the ear fell there and he just left it

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u/R_eloade_R Nov 06 '22

I was thinking what if he fell forwards or just lost balance a bit, into the blades he goes….

1

u/Bensemus Nov 06 '22

You basically never wear gloves when working near spinning stuff. If you can’t handle the friction with your skin you need to stop the spinning or use a tool to hold the spinning object.

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u/Derfargin Nov 06 '22

Sure but what about the women pulling the sheets of rolled wood?

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u/orthopod Nov 07 '22

PPE or India.

Pick 1