Gap says that this project has taught it the limit of its own influence. The solution has to be labor laws that are adequate, respected and enforced. One of the problems in El Salvador is that that was not happening and is not happening. Moving On Economic Obstacles Impede Reforms Before dawn each day, Flor de Mar a Hern ndez leaves her three children in the tent where they have lived since an earthquake leveled her home earlier this year and begins her two-hour commute to the Charter clothing factory. She and the others, like Ms. Mart nez, must be at work before 7 a.m.
Managers close the gate precisely on the hour and dock the pay of anyone who is late.
Inside, rows of sewing machines face blackboards on which supervisors have written the daily quotas for shirts and trousers, roughly 2,000 a day for each line of 36 machines. The pace is relentless, but by local standards it is a pleasant place to work. There are lockers, tiled bathrooms, a medical clinic and an outdoor cafeteria. Large fans and high ceilings keep temperatures down. But Ms. Mart nez remembers just what it took to get this far.