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Comment by gwenzek | Hacker News Reader

I don't know what makes me most sick : That a profitable business like smartphone making rely on child labor

Or that people are using 900$ phones to explain that those children should be happy to have a 1p/day job.

Free market surely doesn't apply to starving 7 years old. What are the alternative they know about? Who brought them to the mine? What the difference between that and slavery? Is slavery allowed because "they could end up as prostitute"?

As Congo owns a big proportion of Cobalt they should be able to hire "adults" to do the work and pay them more. Given they have any incentive to do so, which they currently don't.

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No, the main actors involved have no incentive in doing so.

http://projectcensored.org/19-american-companies-exploit-the...

> Historically, the U.S. government identified sources of materials in Third World countries, and then encouraged U.S. corporations to invest in and facilitate their production. Dating back to the mid-1960s, the U.S. government literally installed the dictatorship of Mobutu Sese Seko, which gave U.S. corporations access to the Congo’s minerals for more than 30 years. However, over the years Mobutu began to limit access by Western corporations, and to control the distribution of resources. In 1998, U.S. military-trained leaders of Rwanda and Uganda invaded the mineral-rich areas of the Congo. The invaders installed illegal colonial-style governments which continue to receive millions of dollars in arms and military training from the United States. Our government and a $5 million Citibank loan maintains the rebel presence in the Congo. Their control of mineral rich areas allows western corporations, such as American Mineral Fields, to illegally mine. Rwandan and Ugandan control over this area is beneficial for both governments and for the corporations that continue to exploit the Congo’s natural wealth.

This should be the top comment. Nearly all of the problems in the world revolve around US installed dictators, financed by US banks, lobbied by US corporations.

it might be true, but it's just not pragmatic to just say "America did it"

The US dictators, banks, corporations and citizens are ruling, financing, lobbying and voting for this regardless. To solve the problem each of these need their incentives aligned (e.g. give dicators a better deal for not allowing this, limit profitability of cobalt mining to the banks, force coprorations to declare "cruelty free", write articles like this one to influence citizens to vote for favourable policies).

This isn’t a breaking news story. This story surged because there’s a smear campaign going on against electric vehicles, which need even more cobalt. [1] [2] Companies have been trying to deal with this for years. Apple and Tesla have made public statements, and have been working to not use this cobalt. Tesla claiming they are "conflict free”. [3]

[1] http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1111767_propaganda-video...

[2] https://youtu.be/nM1WiGkdkVA

[3] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/business/batteries/c...

> electric vehicles, which need even more cobalt

The headline reference to smartphones made me chuckle. Sure, they're the big thing right at this moment, but if electric cars take off they way they look like they could, their cobalt use will massively eclipse that of our dinky little pocket computers.

From what I understand, there is a major supply bottleneck here obstructing the path to exponentially increasing our electric transportation, worse than with the more commonly discussed lithium. Any story about sourcing materials used in batteries should at least be looking at the impact of producing an additional 500 million+ pounds of them a year (and that's just to support Tesla's current projections).

[Not trying to smear EVs by the way, I think they're great and I want one, just pointing out that there are still significant logistical issues to consider.]

This is precisely what I think about whenever the gigafactory is mentioned or wind energy is being discussed.

People want to be believe so badly we can reach sustainability and keep consuming more and more.

Just another perspective: If a child in such an economically underdeveloped country would starve or experience otherwise grave consequences for not doing the work many equate to "slavery", then that country has failed. Its a failed state. At least I think that what you call the phenomena in political science. With "country" most mean the government but one could argue its the society as a whole - Certain norms and values in differ from country to country, but who is responsible for those norms or values, weither they are "good" or "bad" ones? (I dont know, no one really does)

The status quo of failed states (corruption, violence, no infrastructure) is hard to change. What can you do today that will solve everything in 10 years? Whats the magic solution?

No one really seems to be implementing any such functioning top down plan.

But there are certain inter-dependencies in our complex world, one of which is that free trade enables child labor. Child labor is bad but in the context of a failed state that represents an even worse environment then child labor it seems more acceptable (the child has to work, but at least it dosent die of hunger). So its really bad but no one is offering a better solution. Everyone is just complaining and pointing fingers at others.

If the Congo has the Cobalt market cornered. Why can't a business, or the government, leverage that demand to increase earnings from that resource? Or is there cobalt in other areas of the world, but we go to the Congo because we can pay so little?

Rather than blame the people at the bottom of this scheme, the Afticans, the cell phone companies, or even the children, you should blame the people at the top who probably have much more power to effect change. It’s unlikely anyone at the bottom does it because they are malicious, or greedy. People at the bottom have fewer options. Even cell phone companies are passing the cost savings to you, the end consumer, as competitive markets give them fewer optioms too.

The consumers buying things are solely to blame, even if ignorant of the reality since willful ignorance is a thing. If there is any outrage it should be at those who buy these phones and let this happen. Every other part of this scheme is just a cog in the machine, being turned by the complicit consumer.

You should also be careful to stick your hand into something you don’t truly understand, and consider the motivation and implication. You may want it to be stopped to satiafy your own outrage, but they may want it to continue for survival.

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