Very unfortunate, isn't it?
I, too, deeply regret the impossibility of expressing emotions in writing and am very distraught that nobody has yet come up with a solution to this problem.
I may never be able to sleep soundly again while my mind fights with this ungraspable idea.

( - _ -;;)

Keanu Reeves can communicate cues like tone, cadence, and other aspects I'm missing through text?

Makes me want to read some of his writing!

...damned if you don't?

So, first people complain that their employer is blocking or limiting their internet access because they spend too much time on Facebook, now they're complaining that they're forced to sign up for a Facebook account? Oh boy...

FTFY

Uhm, yes. No. Wait. What are we complaining about again?

Ah right. Won't anybody think of the children?!

That's a much more useful comparison. But what about everyday expenses? Does that worker have to eat scraps from the street or can he afford an average, decent (Chinese) meal? And consider that housing and food seems to be mostly provided by Foxconn. Can he buy average clothes at about the average rate as other Chinese? Can he go to the cinema every once in a while, or whatever else young Chinese like to do? Just that he can't afford a luxury item doesn't necessarily mean he's much poorer off than the average Chinese in jobs of similar levels, and that's really what matters. What are his actual expenses and how much does he actually get to keep for his own use? How much of that is tax? The average American factory line worker probably also couldn't afford a new iPhone every month.

This!

I work in Japan and am making twice the money I made last time I worked in Europe, but a disproportionally large part of it goes down the drain for housing and food. I am not buying any more or less gadgets at the end than I did back then, even though I live in roughly the same conditions (arguably worse housing actually) and get more money.

The waitress gets RMB2500 (or thereabouts), not US$400.

I, for one, welcome our robotic overlords.

There's not much else I can do, since they'll take over the world and obsolete humans entirely anyway.

Mod parent up!

Stopping to treat other people and countries as idiots and the Great West as Teh Saviorz is probably the most necessary thing in this discussion.

Again, if you suddenly redistribute the wealth to the factory workers, they'd be peerless kings in their own country. I imagine certain people at the top would have to say something about a factory line worker earning American salaries, especially in China. It's not Apple that's setting the salaries, remember that they're subcontracting to a Chinese/Taiwanese company, controlled by Chinese laws in China.

And people owning the means for producing things... that largely hasn't happened within the last 200 years by mostly leaving China to its own devices, why do you expect it will suddenly happen now through Apple?

Yes, it all sounds so very nice and it would sure be great if everybody was happy and all that, but in reality that simply doesn't happen over night. Fair Labor inspections, how ever phony they are, are a realistic first step in that direction though. Redistribution of wealth is a fantasy, especially in a country that explicitly does *not* adhere to the principles of capitalistic freedom.