Badtux the Snarky Penguin

In a time of chimpanzees, I was a penguin.

Religious fundamentalists are motivated by the sneaking suspicion that someone, somewhere, is having fun -- and that this must be stopped.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Where are those hard-working Chinese?

I constantly get told that the reason the Chinese are kicking our butt in manufacturing is because they are "so hard-working". I'm pretty much shut down again because my Chinese colleagues are off on yet *another* week-long government-sanctioned vacation. So where are those hard-working Chinese? Just wondering. Even when they're not off on vacation, they need to be practically led around by the nose. I spend more time telling them exactly how to write a particular module than I do actually writing modules myself.

But they're cheap, thanks to the Chinese government's currency manipulations. They might not be as hard-working as Americans, they might not be as creative or flexible or productive as Americans, but they're cheap. So that's all that matters, right?

-- Badtux the Working Penguin

Labels: economy, technology

Posted by: BadTux / 2/13/2007 11:32:00 AM

Comments:

A lot of Chinese go to the city so they won't have to work so hard on the farm for nothing. They need factory workers so badly that the government goes out to the boondocks and recruits.
# posted by Gordon : 13/2/07 3:52 PM

Hardly working beats "hard" working.
see:
http://maxspeak.org/mt/archives/002723.html
vs:
http://maxspeak.org/mt/archives/002749.html
Many thanks for your votes of confidence.
--ml
# posted by Martin Langeland : 13/2/07 6:23 PM

man, try working with Bavarians. "Servus!* Ve cannot vurk today, it is holiday, bitte to call next day und now ve go trink beer." plus they get extra Bayern state holidays the rest of Germany doesn't get. I think in the end they get over six weeks off a year, paid.

but yeah I hear you. I worked in Shanghai for awhile and could reasonably see myself driven bugshit by the deer-in-the-headlights syndrome, plus they weren't paying me enough to live in that polluted stinkhole so when the ultimatum came I refused to move there permanently.

* Bavarian for "hello, goodbye, etc." kind of like "aloha"
# posted by 42 : 13/2/07 7:26 PM

I think they must be hard working. Just not very smart is all, and used a lot.
# posted by BBC : 14/2/07 4:58 AM

Yes, cheap is all that matters.
# posted by K. Ron Silkwood : 14/2/07 11:36 AM

ah-so -- those are the americon-i-zed chinese....they have learned very well from us!!
# posted by azgoddess : 14/2/07 2:18 PM

Honor Roll

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"Keep fighting for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce." -- Molly Ivins, 1944-2007

"The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."

-- Plato

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