Frame Manufacture

[ellivron55]

As somebody involved at the consumer stage of optics I am ashamed to say I have never seen how frames are actually manufactured.Does anybody know if a video actually exists? Is it possible to tour a Chinese factory or Italian factory? I have visions of underpaid Chinese workers threading supras all day or are they done mechanically?
Thanks

[chip anderson]

Easier to get in to Hong Cong or Tywan factory. Some mfgs. use films of frame mfg. (too short to learn much though) as part of thier "instruction" presentations. You might be able to get a lend lease on one of these.

Chip

[For-Life]

As somebody involved at the consumer stage of optics I am ashamed to say I have never seen how frames are actually manufactured.Does anybody know if a video actually exists? Is it possible to tour a Chinese factory or Italian factory? I have visions of underpaid Chinese workers threading supras all day or are they done mechanically?
Thanks


I wonder how underpaid they really are. Remember, the cost of living is much less expensive there.

[harry a saake]

Jerry huang, who is over in china right now, is our resident expert on frame mfg, look up all posts on jerry huang, or you could email him, he,s full of info

[DocInChina]

Is it possible to tour a Chinese factory or Italian factory? I have visions of underpaid Chinese workers threading supras all day or are they done mechanically?Thanks

It is possible to tour factories in China if your are a prospective buyer or you are friends with the factory owners (or have mutual friends). What someone in the US considers underpaid is not what people in China would consider underpaid.

Factory workers live in dorms (of varying quality) and food, healthcare is provided to them and sometimes their families depending on the factory. Factory workers can earn 1000RMB (~130USD) to 3000RMB depending on their skill level and job requirement. To put this in perspective, if you are a working couple (non-factory) you can rent an apartment for 600RMB per month (including electric and gas). Food can cost you 3-400RMB per month depending on your family size. Other expenses can cost 200RMB per month. If this couple is earning collectively 3-5000RMB per month they are able to save money.

A US autoworker who makes 75-100,000USD per month will consider an income of 30,000USD per month as a slave wage. Is it a wonder all of our large automakers are on the verge of economic collapse?

I actually took some closeup photos of workers in my friends eyewear factory making eyeglass partsa couple of weeks ago. I will try to upload them later.

I am sure Jerry Huang has lots of interesting photos on his computer to share, too.

Doc

[Uni-Clip]

Eyewear industry is already a higher pay job in China. Things changed.....it's no longer the kind of slave and sweat shop places you would imagine some 20 years ago......

A good book to recommend is The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman about globalisation. The trend is affecting our small eyewear industry too.....

Lak Cheong
www.acuityeyewear.com

[Samuel Jong]

Eyewear industry is already a higher pay job in China. Things changed.....it's no longer the kind of slave and sweat shop places you would imagine some 20 years ago......

A good book to recommend is The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman about globalisation. The trend is affecting our small eyewear industry too.....

Lak Cheong
www.acuityeyewear.com (http://www.acuityeyewear.com)
Do you still produce Uni-Clip in Hongkong?

[Uni-Clip]

Do you still produce Uni-Clip in Hongkong?

Yes, we are still producing Uni-Clip and it has developed to new generation which we called Uni-Clip XP. See our various products at www.acuityeyewear.com (http://www.acuityeyewear.com) .

[Uni-Clip]

Do you still produce Uni-Clip in Hongkong?

Yes, we are still producing Uni-Clip and it has developed to new generation which we called Uni-Clip XP. See our various products at www.acuityeyewear.com (http://www.acuityeyewear.com) .

[Aarlan]

I second the idea that the idea of poor work conditions and cheap (read low quality) products are, for the most part, a relic of the past.

I had the privelege to visit a few industrial zones near shanghai, and we toured such plants as the Ingersol-Rand (industrial compressors and such). It was absolutely amazing. The work ethic and efficiency, combined w/ the investment in equipment and technology was absolutely mind numbing. I witnessed first hand why we are getting our a$$es kicked in manufacturing...Adequate capital investment and equipment, low wages, great work ethic...thats a hell of a combination.

AA

[RGC_man]

The other night on the news there was sickening film footage of a Tibetan nun being shot in cold blood by Chinese soldiers.

http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/content/news_syndication/article_06111tibet.shtml

Personally I could never trade with such a country, and think the olympics should only be given to democracies. Do the owners of large western companies sleep well at night after trading with China?

[Jacqui]

The other night on the news there was sickening film footage of a Tibetan nun being shot in cold blood by Chinese soldiers.

http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/content/news_syndication/article_06111tibet.shtml

Personally I could never trade with such a country, and think the olympics should only be given to democracies. Do the owners of large western companies sleep well at night after trading with China?


I've been wanting to ask the same questions.

[DocInChina]

Personally I could never trade with such a country, and think the olympics should only be given to democracies. Do the owners of large western companies sleep well at night after trading with China?


As most of us know, governments make policy. The citizens of countries have to live with their government's decisions. This applies to democracies as well.

Owners of large western companies are providing much need jobs to people who were living in extreme poverty 20 years ago.

The democratic process does not happen over night. We do not have to look very far back in history to see how democracies treated minorities or how they treated territories of their commonwealth.

Doc

[RGC_man]

As most of us know, governments make policy. The citizens of countries have to live with their government's decisions. This applies to democracies as well.

Owners of large western companies are providing much need jobs to people who were living in extreme poverty 20 years ago.

The democratic process does not happen over night. We do not have to look very far back in history to see how democracies treated minorities or how they treated territories of their commonwealth.

Doc
Agreed, and if Britain reverted to its bloody colonial past I would be the first to call for London to lose the 2012 olympics.

Sometimes the democratic process does happen overnight; this brave man looked to me like he was ready to vote:

http://www.time.com/time/time100/leaders/profile/rebel.html

Lets be honest. Western companies are not investing in China to slowly encourage democracy or bring jobs to impoverished peasants. They are there for profits and cheap consumer goods.

Shame we don't use some of our economic power over the Chinese government to encourage political change. Stop shooting innocent civilians or we buy our goods elsewhere.

[DocInChina]

Agreed, and if Britain reverted to its bloody colonial past I would be the first to call for London to lose the 2012 olympics.

You have that luxury of living in the UK in 2006. When Britain was living through its bloody colonial past, what were the citizens of Britain doing to make change? For that matter what were most citizens in the US (prior to the 1960's) doing to eliminate discrimination laws.

I do not disagree with your position but it is much easier to take the high road while your country is at its perceived moral high road.

Lets be honest. Western companies are not investing in China to slowly encourage democracy or bring jobs to impoverished peasants. They are there for profits and cheap consumer goods.

No question that this is the case. Does it matter what the manufacturers reasons are if it does good for so many people. When you donate to charity, do you know how each dollar (or Euro) is being spent?

Ben and Jerry's ice cream donates part of the proceeds of sales to charity. Does this encourage you to buy more ice cream or prevent you from buying from another ice cream company? Does your buying their ice cream make you philanthropist?


Shame we don't use some of our economic power over the Chinese government to encourage political change. Stop shooting innocent civilians or we buy our goods elsewhere.

You cannot encourage political change in China through force of will or economic pressure. China officially has 1.3 billion people (unofficially 1.5-1.6 billion). The greatest percentage of the population is uneducated and poor. As personal wealth increases, job opportunities increase and education increases change will occur naturally. Not on the west’s timeline but the timeline that is right for China. The positive changes in China over the last 30 years are miraculous and we can only expect further positive change over the next 30 years.

[RGC_man]

So just turn a blind eye to flagrant human rights abuses as long as cheap goods keep rolling off the production line, in the vague hope it might get better in 30 years? It is sad that America the home of liberty, does not take a stronger line.

[DocInChina]

So just turn a blind eye to flagrant human rights abuses as long as cheap goods keep rolling off the production line, in the vague hope it might get better in 30 years? It is sad that America the home of liberty, does not take a stronger line.

I see you have strong feelings about this and I respect that. I have been living in China for 4 years now and traveling here since '98. If you have the opportunity I encourage you to come here and see what life is really like here. It is not what you imagine.

[Chris Ryser]

Shame we don't use some of our economic power over the Chinese government to encourage political change. Stop shooting innocent civilians or we buy our goods elsewhere.


China is the richest country right now...........and could bancrupt the USA any time they want, and maybe the Brits along with it,................to buy your goods elsewhere you will have to wait a few more years until you suppliers decide to move their opeartions to India as next step.

[optirep]

Wrong Not yet Chris!


Welcome To The Asian Century By 2050, China and maybe India will overtake the U.S. economy in size.
http://i.cnn.net/money/.element/img/1.0/logos/fortune_logo.gif (http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune)
By Jeffrey D. Sachs
January 12, 2004
(FORTUNE Magazine) – To friend and foe alike, the U.S. appears to be the unchallenged power in the world. The French call the U.S. a hyperpower. Neoconservatives believe it is a new Rome. But both greatly exaggerate U.S. preeminence--and its staying power. American power rests mainly on advanced technology, which is increasingly available to the whole world. While the economies of China and India are considerably smaller than that of the U.S., China is likely to overtake and India to equal the U.S. economy in size by mid-century. And as the world's economic center of gravity shifts to Asia, U.S. preeminence will inevitably diminish.
Measured in comparable units of purchasing power, the U.S. economy, at $10.7 trillion, is currently almost twice the size of China's ($6.3 trillion) and three times the size of India's ($3.6 trillion). The much higher U.S. per capita income, almost eight times that of China and roughly 11 times that of India, is partially offset by the much larger populations of the two Asian countries. But with per capita incomes in China and India likely to grow more rapidly than in the U.S., thus narrowing the large gaps in living standards, both Asian economies will eventually surpass the U.S.
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When poorer countries like China and India are relatively well managed politically and economically, they tend to grow more rapidly than richer countries. The poorer countries have an advantage of relative backwardness, in that they can import the know-how of the leading economies. That occurs through the importation of capital, flows of foreign investment, and the training of scientists and engineers. Technological catch-up after World War II enabled Western Europe to narrow the income gap with the U.S. and let the poorer countries of Southern Europe (Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain) narrow the income gap with their richer Northern European neighbors.
Technological catch-up can be frustrated if a lagging country is politically unstable or economically mismanaged. That was the case with Eastern Europe, which languished under communism. Similarly, both China and India squandered the chance for rapid economic growth in the first decades after World War II because of Mao's communism and Nehru's socialism. The trigger for rapid catching up in China was Deng Xiaoping's liberalization of the economy beginning in 1978; in India it was Finance Minister Manmohan Singh's dismantling of the so-called license raj beginning in 1991.
Now both economies are soaring. China's aggregate GNP has grown by about 10% a year since the late 1970s and India's has grown by about 6% a year since 1991, compared with annual U.S. economic growth of about 3.5%. China's and India's soaring growth rates will decline as the income gap with the U.S. narrows. The closer both countries come to the technological levels of the U.S. and other rich countries, the fewer opportunities there will be to import technological know-how. The slowdown is likely to be gradual, however, so both countries, and others like them, will have economic growth greater than that of the U.S. for decades to come.
Econometric evidence suggests that when the income gap between China and the U.S. narrows by half, China's growth advantage will decline by about 1.4 percentage points per year. China's per capita income is currently about 13% of that of the U.S., and per capita GNP in China is growing about 4.6 percentage points per year faster than in the U.S. So when China's per capita income reaches 26% of the U.S. level, the annual growth advantage should fall to about 3.2 percentage points. Still later, when China's per capita income level reaches about half the U.S. level, China's growth advantage will be about 1.8 percentage points.
Extrapolating based on this rule of thumb, China would reach about half the U.S. per capita income level by the year 2050, while its projected population of some 1.4 billion will be about 3.4 times the U.S. population of about 400 million. At that point China's GNP would be about 75% larger than that of the U.S. By a similar calculation, assuming that India's annual per capita income growth now exceeds the U.S. rate by about four percentage points, India's per capita income would reach a little more than a quarter of the U.S. level by 2050, with a population nearly four times as large, leading to an overall economy about the same size as that of the U.S.
Of course war, disease, political instability, and even less tumultuous economic blunders or shifts in population patterns can play havoc with such projections. Yet the trends strongly suggest a future decline in the relative importance in the world of the U.S. economy and its eclipse in size by China and perhaps India. The prediction is undergirded by the clear evidence that China, India, and other fast-growing Asian economies are devoting a rising share of national income to R&D, as they need to do to catch up technologically.
Moreover, the U.S. is facing not only the rise of China and India but also the rise of an integrated Asian economy that links southern Asia, Southeast Asia, and northeastern Asia. Countries throughout Asia are working hard to overcome past strategic animosities in order to create increasingly integrated flows of merchandise, finance, and technology. On the basis of current trends, and as a very rough estimate, this integrated Asian economy could reach about half of world GNP (up from a current one-third), with about 60% of the world's population. The U.S. share of world population will remain about 5%, which means its overall economic weight could slide from more than one-fifth of world GNP today in purchasing-power terms to perhaps half that by 2050.
From an economic point of view the U.S. is likely to be a beneficiary of this process, just as it was a beneficiary of the recovery of Western Europe's economy after World War II. U.S. consumers will benefit from a dazzling increase in the variety of Asian products at low prices. The world as a whole will benefit from an acceleration of scientific and technological advances coming from Asia. One dramatic case in recent years: China's scientists used a traditional herbal remedy to develop antimalaria drugs that will save the lives of millions of Africans and Southeast Asians. If ideological and religious opposition to stem-cell and other biotech research in the U.S. stands in the way of progress, an eager scientific community in Asia could quickly surge ahead in that field.
From a political point of view, the vainglorious vision of the U.S. as the new Rome will be dashed. We got a small glimpse of the coming U.S. eclipse this fall, when President Bush traveled to Asia for an Asia-Pacific economic meeting. The U.S. tried to find Asian allies to bash China over its exchange-rate policies but found no takers, as the other Asian countries sided with China. China's economic diplomacy has already trumped that of the U.S., since China's Asian neighbors clearly understand that China is their engine of growth.
Of course the developing countries of Asia could stumble on their way to prosperity, and some U.S. strategists harbor hopes that Asia's dynamic rise can somehow be contained. Yet we are so interconnected in our fates that any serious Asian crisis would almost surely enmesh the whole world, including the U.S., in dire troubles. Nor could America's 400 million population by mid-century have a prayer of containing Asia's five billion people. Assuming Asia's continued economic success, the 21st century could well be a period of unprecedented prosperity and scientific advance, but one in which the U.S. will have to learn to be one of many successful economies rather than the world's indispensable country.

[Chris Ryser]

U.S. Balance of Trade
in (NAICS 339115) Ophthalmic Goods
With All Countries
As of APRIL 2005
(In Thousands U.S. dollars) China = -258,140

= $ - 258,140,000.00



http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/statistics/product/naics/naicsctry/balance/b339115.html

[RGC_man]

I see you have strong feelings about this and I respect that. I have been living in China for 4 years now and traveling here since '98. If you have the opportunity I encourage you to come here and see what life is really like here. It is not what you imagine.I have family in Taiwan who regularly visit China (via a third country of course), so have a pretty good idea of Chinese military threats and human rights abuses.

[aaron]

Human rights abuses occur in every country, including the modern western world. They just happen in differant ways. China wages specifically related to the optical industry have gotten better and better. It is a good job in China......right now.

Southeast asia and India are the new China for crap optical goods at lower than poverty wages.

When I worked for Charmant they had a spectacular video on frame manuf. and believe it or not, it was much more educational than it was an advertisement. See if your rep can get a copy.

ad

[DocInChina]

I have family in Taiwan who regularly visit China (via a third country of course), so have a pretty good idea of Chinese military threats and human rights abuses.

Really? I would be interested to know the military installations your family in Taiwan visited on their trips to China (via a third country of course) and the instances of human rights abuses they witnessed.

My next question is, why in the world do they keep visiting if China is such an evil place?

I have been living in China for 4 years (and visited regularly for 4 years before that). In 8 years I have not witnessed human rights abuse nor have I ever felt unsafe near police or military people. Seems we are speaking of 2 different Chinas.

[Chris Ryser]

I have been living in China for 4 years (and visited regularly for 4 years before that). In 8 years I have not witnessed human rights abuse nor have I ever felt unsafe near police or military people. Seems we are speaking of 2 different Chinas.



Doc.................you are the guy that should and knows best among the Opiboard gang about this subject.

If RGC does not agree he must have collected some rust a few years ago and maybe they have no DW40 in the UK.

[Uni-Clip]

I have family in Taiwan who regularly visit China (via a third country of course), so have a pretty good idea of Chinese military threats and human rights abuses.

Plan a trip to China and see it for yourself. I'll offer to show you our optical factories and really have a good feel of how workers live there.

If you are a Chinese, I'm sure you know, deep down in your heart, that Chinese can't be forced to do things by any sort of foreign pressure, e.g. to undergo a political change, especially. Western companies are surely not coming to China for the sake of improving China's human rights or uplifting democratic ideals. However, they do serve positively to bring China into an open world/society and that is gradually changing China's political system for the good. It won't take 30 years......I'm sure.

On the contrary, Taiwan is deterioting with all this corruption and political mess, which should be more worrisome for your Taiwan family. What the hell is that Mr. Chen doing with his presidency, when 62%(recent poll) want him to step down?

[DocInChina]

If you are a Chinese, I'm sure you know, deep down in your heart, that Chinese can't be forced to do things by any sort of foreign pressure, e.g. to undergo a political change, especially. Western companies are surely not coming to China for the sake of improving China's human rights or uplifting democratic ideals. However, they do serve positively to bring China into an open world/society and that is gradually changing China's political system for the good. It won't take 30 years......I'm sure.

On the contrary, Taiwan is deterioting with all this corruption and political mess, which should be more worrisome for your Taiwan family. What the hell is that Mr. Chen doing with his presidency, when 62%(recent poll) want him to step down?

UC,

Well said. I could not agree with you more.

Doc

[Happylady]

Way back in 1979 or 1980 my class at school toured a frame factory in Maryland. It was very interesting. I have no idea what the name of it was or what frames they made. If anyone knows I would love to hear.

[akeroptical]

A US autoworker who makes 75-100,000USD per month will consider an income of 30,000USD per month as a slave wage.


If you think we pull this kind of money in the states you are sadly mistaken. I realize you were just making an example but those figures are crazy. Even if your talking anual saleries, $100,000 is still way more than most Americans make a year.

[Samuel Jong]

Is it optical discussion forums or human rights/political forums?:hammer:

[ellivron55]

Surely we all started out in this great optical world with hopes and dreams of helping our patients/clients.Unfortunately money/profits /overheads /staying in business become the holy grail as the years progress with the result we can become complacent with how people are treated. The recent expose of the factory manufacturing Apple iPods in China made very uncomfortable viewing, Dormatories,14 hour days,security,visits from family once a month etc.We cannot just pretend it doesnt exist.Where will it end.

[Jacqui]

Is it optical discussion forums or human rights/political forums?:hammer:


These are things that need to be discussed.

[Samuel Jong]

These are things that need to be discussed.
But never heard talking about Israel.

[Jacqui]

But never heard talking about Israel.

I would discuss Isreal too, at another time.

[Samuel Jong]

I would discuss Isreal too, at another time.
It's fair.:cheers:

[walleye]

In reply to Doc In China's comments: Do you mean 75,000-100,000 USD (US Dollars?) per year for an auto worker? I'll go on the assembly line in Detroit for $100,000 per month.

[DocInChina]

If you think we pull this kind of money in the states you are sadly mistaken. I realize you were just making an example but those figures are crazy. Even if your talking anual saleries, $100,000 is still way more than most Americans make a year.


I mean't to write

A US autoworker who makes 75-100,000USD per year will consider an income of 30,000USD per year as a slave wage.