this post was submitted on 15 Nov 2024
393 points (97.1% liked)

Technology

59415 readers
2812 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
393
Chinese immigrants in the U.S. are running Temu shipping centers out of their homes (restofworld.org)
submitted 2 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
90 comments fedilink hide all child comments
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 69 points 2 days ago (27 children)

Temu is insanely popular. Don't underestimate this. Yes, it's pure crap, but people buy it. They earn bucks.

Meaning, it's not a valid argument to say it's crap, and then it's not a problem. Temu is a problem.

But then we have to start another discussion about the free market, because then Temu is valid.

Then what? Legit question, I don't have the answer to.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The thing is that it's not PURE crap.

It's kind of like going to a flea market. Most of it is crap and you can still find some decent and good stuff that's way cheaper than it should be.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Gues why: Ultra cheap labor.
And probably not 100% voluntary.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I don't need to guess. I know from having been to China and having talked to people.

It's mostly a combination of 3 things:

  1. Tons of infrastructure. If you decide to start manufacturing some random thing you can easily get all the stuff you need to get started.
  2. Regulations are generally very favorable to small startups and businesses. This is partly why so much of the stuff on Temu is crap.
  3. A huge population. That's the main source of ultra cheap labor. Farmers in rural China can still make as little as $1.90 per day. All a factory owner needs to offer is more than that and they'll have a line of applicants.
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago

But those reasons aren't nefarious

load more comments (25 replies)