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One of my favorite whales inspired me to not focus on making money on Steemit, but to use Steemit to make a better version of myself. To use the platform to improve my skills and to share my knowledge. I am taking his advice and improving my writing. This is my original thoughts on this matter and where I borrowed opinions, I provided the reference at the bottom.
Please read and leave your comments on what you think.

Abstract

Apple has been constantly accused of using child labor in their factories. They have admitted that 3 of its suppliers were using at least 11 underage children. The exact ages and locations where these violations took place have not been revealed.

Keywords: Child Labor.

Who Made Your iPhone

The Apple share price has been zooming up while they have been accused of making use of child labor in their factories. Apple has been accused of “contracting fifteen-year-olds to work on its factory floors” (Telegraph, 2010).

Ethical Question

It has been argued that Apple is contracting underage workers through its suppliers. This fact raises questions in the public’s minds that is Apple being unethical. It can be argued that Apple was not aware of the infractions considering that they took action against the offenders upon uncovering the practices. Apple has a strong policy against employment of minors and their investigations which uncovered these practices and the subsequent action that they took against the factories that were found violating this policy shows that Apple was no unethical and the issue of prices zooming up is not necessarily related to the incident (Garside, 2013).

Against Apple

Although the countries where these infractions took place are not specified, most of them are poor Asian countries where families are struggling to make ends meet. They cannot afford to send their children to school and would rather have them work to provide for the family. When Apple restricts them from earning a living at their factories, they are denying them the right to basics. The families could go hungry or become homeless without the income of these underage workers.

Foxconn Picture

In Favor of Apple.

The fact that these underage workers come from poor families where education is probably lacking, Apple’s enforcement of the underage policies points to the fact that Apple values education and taking these kids off their factories could encourage them to go back to school to improve their skills and in turn have better chances of getting better-paying jobs and improving their living conditions. This fact is shown by the penalties that Apple took against the violators of the policies, making them send the minors to school and pay their study fees and an allowance. (Garside, 2013) The fundamental value here is the right to an education that each child has.

Ethics or the Law.

Apple made decisions based on the laws of the countries where the factories were situated. When one considers the ethics side, it can be argued that in those countries, it was not an unethical behavior for the factories to hire these underage workers, however, in other countries, the practice would have been both unethical and against the law. In most cases, what is unethical can also be unlawful. It can be concluded, therefore, that making decisions based on ethics can have the same result or different result as when based on the law depending on which country the case is being considered.

To conclude, Apple did not show any unethical behavior in handling the cases where underage children were employed at their factories. The issue of the share price zooming up is just a pertinent issue which had nothing to do with ethics.

References

Garside, Juliette. "Child Labour Uncovered In Apple's Supply Chain". the Guardian. N.p., 2013. Web. 12 Sept. 2017.

"Apple Admits Using Child Labour". Telegraph.co.uk. N.p., 2010. Web. 13 Sept. 2017.