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    Hundreds Desert Chocolate Factory over $8.35/Hour Pay

    This story comes from the Yahoo! Contributor Network, where individuals publish their unique perspectives on some of the world’s most popular websites.
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    COMMENTARY | Four hundred foreign student workers walked off the job at a Pennsylvania chocolate factory because they claim low wages and high rent make it impossible for them to make any money.

    Congratulations! These students discovered what people all over the country discovered years ago: not every job pays a living wage.

    According to The Lookout, an affiliated company of Hershey Corporation hired 400 foreign students to work at their Palmyra packing plant over the summer as part of a State Department inter-cultural jobs exchange program. There are so many things wrong with this idea that I hardly know where to start--but let's give it a try:

    • It is unbelievable that 400 foreign workers need to be brought in to fill those jobs in a time when 9.2 percent of Americans are unemployed, with millions more who have completely exhausted their benefits.
    • While $8.35 an hour is not an exciting wage, these students knew what the job would pay before they accepted it and they still chose to come to America.

    Hershey spokesman Kirk Saville said the factory is operated by Exel and that the workers were hired through an unnamed temporary help placement agency. Whatever agency that was did a lousy job in finding temporary workers when they chose to go overseas to hire workers that local residents would surely love to have. If there was a federal cash incentive or tax incentive to participate in this foreign hire program, then a congressional inquiry should be launched.

    Outsourcing jobs is a huge factor in American unemployment. Manufacturing prices might appear cheaper when made overseas, but the savings is lost in the enormous, prolonged detrimental impact on the American economy from such actions.

    Hershey's could give a great big sweet kiss to every unemployed person living near their factories by assuring that no foreign workers are brought in to fill jobs that a qualified American could fill. After all, Hershey's is the "great American chocolate bar" and it probably should be made by Americans.

     

    10 comments

    • ddb  •  9 mths ago
      If they don't like their job they have the freedom to quit and find another job!! For god's sake people, this is an internship. Our daughter did one in NYC and was paid $12 an hour, but it cost us $24 an hour for her to live there.
    • LM  •  9 mths ago
      Thank you Dan McGinnis! This is an OUTRAGE considering how hard people have had to struggle to find work. Think of how many people that would have impacted if those 400 jobs had gone to unemployed Americans - because it's not just the single unemployed worker that's affected, but that employee's spouse and kids.
    • Concerned Sit ti sin  •  9 mths ago
      BOYCOTT Hershey's Product for bringing in SLAVE labor to work at their Sweat Shops!!
      They save money and yet raise the price of their product while making it SMALLER!!!! What the H*LL is going on in this country???????????? And we wonder why social security is going to be in trouble.......too many foreigners not paying social security to work here and yet get many of the benefits not even an American born qualifies for!!!!!
    • patriot1776  •  9 mths ago
      they are violation of their J1 visa status. Deportation now.
    • Rochameister  •  9 mths ago
      universities love foreign students because they pay lots of money to go to school here. these people are not really the problem. the real problem is that universities, like so many other important institutions in our country, are more focused on making money than in really educating and preparing young people for a JOB. it's just another business; another way to get in your pocket.
    • we the people  •  9 mths ago
      This is what happens when you hire from socialist countries...they expect to get $8.00+ an hour for doing nothing. Deport them ASAP, and hire Americans. Yes, there are plenty of people who would work for this wage in order to feed their family.
    • ,mo231  •  9 mths ago
      time to boycott Hershey. Didn't they close their Pennsylvania plant and move the work overseas??
      • Mike 9 mths ago
        N, Hershey didn't. They are building ANOTHER factory in Hershey, PA right now.
      • patriot1776 9 mths ago
        Go ahead you union goon.
    • WISCO  •  9 mths ago
      Yay, right wing outsourcing! Right in our own country too! Although Bill Gates is an outsourcing a** too. Tariff?
    • Vern  •  9 mths ago
      Ship there butt home we dont need any more nuts from abroad ! If their homeland is so great why rare they here we ve got to stop this stupidity! NOW
    • Debbie Myers  •  9 mths ago
      LET THEM WALK.....Home! Give the jobs to Americans who are begging for jobs!
      • Joliet Jake 9 mths ago
        Are you retarded?? Would you work for $8.00 an hour that don't even cover gas, rent, food, and medical insurance?? Only retarded people like you would take jobs like that!!
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