On Tuesday, May 10, Tesla CEO Elon Musk praised the Chinese factory workers at the Shanghai gigafactory for pulling extreme hours while taking a shot at American workers who won't do the same.
Elon Musk Praises Chinese Workers
According to The Guardian, the billionaire said that there are " many talented, hardworking people in China" who believe in manufacturing.
He also pointed out that the workers are burning "the 3 a.m. oil," and they won't leave the factory until the work is done, unlike in America, where people are "trying to avoid going to work at all."
Musk's comment comes as Tesla's Shanghai gigafactory pushes its factory workers to the limit in order to meet production targets amid an ongoing pandemic lockdown.
In April. the automaker restricted its Shanghai factory workers from leaving the factory under a closed-loop system that was originally developed by Chinese authorities to contain the participants of the Beijing Olympics.
Also Read: Tesla Gigafactory Shanghai Suspension Worsens; Friday Reopening Uncertain
While locked inside, the factory workers were reportedly made to work 12-hour shifts, six days in a row, and sleep on factory floors since they couldn't go home, according to Business Insider.
The production at the plant was forced to halt because of parts shortages.
Labor rights and safety violations have been reported at Tesla's Shanghai factory since 2018, with some factory workers making as little as $1,500 a month in what is called the "Giga-sweatshop."
Even in the United States, the billionaire is known for disregarding labor norms and work-life balance. Musk infamously said that "nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week."
Musk also has bragged about making the automaker's US employees work 100-hour weeks while claiming to have worked 120-hour weeks himself.
In March, Musk called a meeting for his other company, SpaceX, at 1:00 a.m. Eastern Standard Time.
China's Extreme Work Culture
These practices are on par with China's extreme work culture nicknamed 996, in which workers are expected to work from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., six days a week, according to New York Post.
The practice has been the source of several protests in the past few years and has been characterized as a form of modern slavery.
Eli Friedman, a labor expert and associate professor of international and comparative labor at Cornell University's ILR School, said that Musk's remark just proves that the American corporations are taking advantage of the low cost of labor in China and its flexibility.
For bosses like Musk, that is a comparative advantage, and the fact that there are hundreds of thousands of workers that they can wake up in the middle of the night and put on the production line is concerning.
Friedman added that the whole thing is tapping into an Orientalist narrative about "robotic" Chinese workers that Musk said is a "good thing."
Officially, the Chinese labor law mandates a 40-hour workweek, with employees allowed up to 36 hours of overtime a month, resulting in just more than a 48-hour workweek.
Employees in China are often asked to sign a striver's pledge, which removes their right to get overtime pay and paid time off.
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This article is owned by Tech Times
Written by Sophie Webster
