The New York Times reported a riot by more than 1000 Chinese workers last week protesting low wages and poor living conditions at a factory that makes toys for McDonald’s Happy Meals.

In the statement released Thursday, China Labor Watch said dozens of workers were arrested and many others were injured in protests on Saturday and Sunday.

The rights groups accused the factory of violating Chinese labor laws, including provisions limiting overtime to 36 hours a month. Instead, the group said, total overtime per worker can reach 70 hours a month, and workers can have their pay deducted if they refuse to work the extra hours. Workers earn $71.75 a month, the minimum wage in Dongguan, but also pay a quarter of their earnings for room and board, the group said.

A spokesperson from McDonald’s said they are expecting a full investigation by their supplier. Ronald McDonald could not be reached for comment.

We are all for blind casting…but damn! Brad Pitt’s production company has selected Angelina Jolie to star in the Mariane Pearl story. Pearl, a French-born Black woman, was married to journalist Daniel Pearl who was kidnapped and beheaded by Pakistani militants in 1999. Pearl, who was pregnant at the time of the murder, wrote about her experience. Jolie will play Pearl.

As if there is a glut of roles for Black actresses…

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Residents of Detroit know very well about the “Ghetto Tax” discussed in this article from today’s New York Times.

From the article:

Drivers from low-income neighborhoods of New York, Hartford and Baltimore, insuring identical cars and with the same driving records as those from middle-class neighborhoods, paid $400 more on average for a year’s insurance.The poor are also the main customers for appliances and furniture at “rent to own” stores, where payments are stretched out at very high interest rates; in Wisconsin, a $200 television can end up costing $700.

Those were just two examples among several cited in a report Tuesday showing that poor urban residents frequently pay hundreds if not thousands of dollars a year in extra costs for everyday necessities. The study said some of the disparities were due to real differences in the cost of doing business in poor areas, some to predatory financial practices and some to consumer ignorance.

Detroiters have the addition of city taxes, trash taxes, higher water rates and other issues that make the poor poorer and raise the cost of doing business in the city which in turn lowers city tax revenues by driving business to the suburbs. These problems contribute to a higher rate of poverty which contributes to higher crime rates.

Read More HERE (Nytimes.com requires free registration)

The Detroit Free Press recently published an Op-Ed by Roger Clegg, of the anti-affirmative action Center for Equal Opportunity, that was intended to muddy the waters of Michigan’s affirmative action debate. Clegg sites a recent survey which “suggests that voters are more likely to oppose the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative (MCRI) if the phrase ‘affirmative action’ is used in the polling question.”

This is because the MCRI hopes to ban affirmative action in some State of Michigan entities like universities, and while this initiative is likely to gain traction in some segments of the population, most Michiganders recognize that discrimination still exists in the state. The actual ballot language uses these words - “ban affirmative action”, and this is troubling for the “anti-” groups because it neutralizes one of their most effective tools - negative language. (more…)