Wal-Mart and Hanes: Partners in Sweatshop Crimes

Not surprisingly, TOS Dominicana produces for a number of other large retailers, including Wal-Mart, which is also the factory's largest customer. The abuses that have taken place at the factory constitute a clear violations of Wal-Mart's Standards for Suppliers, as well as Domincan law. USAS wrote a letter to Wal-Mart, imploring the company to act with integrity and compel Hanes to clean up this sweatshop. Yet Wal-Mart has not even acknowledged our letter and has turned a blind eye to the workers at the factory, just as they do with their own domestic employees.

This fall, students worked on another case involving a Wal-Mart sweatshop. At the Chong Won factory in the Phillipines, workers were paid below the minimum wage, were subject to forced and unpaid overtime and were violently attacked for attempting to organize for better conditions. Yet Wal-Mart did nothing to end the violence and mistreatment of workers and allowed these abuses to continue, just as they have done with TOS.

Wal-Mart Watch, which intially wrote about the Chong Won case on their website, has also taken an interest in the TOS case and posted more information about the Wal-Mart connection on their blog. You'll see from reading the other blog posts that Wal-Mart's willingness to abuse its employees extends across the globe, from India to China to Canada to the Dominican Republic.

To get involved in taking action against Wal-Mart, including upcoming Wal-Mart protests, stay tuned to this blog or email zack@usasnet.org for more details.