Something Sour With Foreign Student Labor At Hershey Chocolates

PITTSBURGH (NewsRadio 1020 KDKA) - When you think of Hershey, you think of the great American chocolate company headquartered in Hershey, Pa.  But earlier this month, news came out about foreign guest worker students being exploited by Hershey for cheap labor.

The students, who came to Pennsylvania through the State Department's J-1 guest worker visa program, say that instead of the promised light work and educational experience of visiting America, they're working in "sweat shop" conditions,  toiling on fast-moving assembly lines, packing and lifting 50-pound boxes of  chocolates, and working 4o-plus hours a week.

To make it worse, they said their wages were so low, they weren't earning enough to pay back their expenses to come here.

KDKA AM's Larry and John talk to Mark Troutman with the National Guestworker Alliance, a group that helps exploited guest workers.