Workers are a sector of modern society who live from selling their labour in the factories. The absorption of Indonesia into the world capitalist economy has made workers a central force in earning foreign exchange for the state. Workers in the industrial sector number about 10.5 million people. The workers' major contribution to the economy has not been repaid with decent conditions in their social, economic and political life.
Indonesian workers remain poor.
Workers have gradually fought this oppression with strikes. With the acute exploitation and poverty of workers and their increasing resistance, on 23 October 1994 in Ambarawa, Central Java, the PPBI was formed as a free trade union. PPBI's program combined economic and political demands. The PPBI's form of struggle is strikes and mass actions. The PPBI is convinced that the workers are an important, central force for the democratic movement.