“
If they give us 800 renminbi a month, we’ll go back to work right away,” said one young man, describing a pay increase that would add about $117 a month to an average pay that is now around
$150 monthly. :
: He said he had read on the Internet of considerably higher wages at other factories in China and expected Honda to match them with an immediate pay increase. Many workers at other factories in southeastern China
already earn $300 a month :
:, but they do so only through considerable overtime. And even that higher income is not enough to embark on the middle-class dream in China of owning a small apartment and subcompact car. Officially, though, the government is discouraging heavy reliance on overtime, and workers here said that Honda was not assigning much.