(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-09-03 20:14

SHANGHAI -- McDonald's has approved a pay raise for more than 95 percent of its employees in China, a move that may redeem the fastfood giant's reputation in the wake of being accused of underpaying its staff.

The payment adjustment, the first ever initiated by the hamburger king since it came to China 17 years ago, was launched on Saturday, the company sources said.

The move was in response to extensive public outcries that the company, along with KFC and Pizza Hut, has been underpaying their part-time staff in the southern city of Guangzhou by up to 40 percent below the local statutory minimum wage of nearly 1 US dollar an hour, he said.

The beneficiaries, mainly part-time workers in about 75 percent of McDonald's outlets across the country, will see their basic payment raised by 12 to 65 percent.

The salary incident was a result of the development of China's social supervision system and the growth of people's consciousness of social injustice, said Wang Lingyi, professor with Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, pointing out that "many foreign firms are forced to rebuild corporate image".

"Just depending on PR activities to build up corporate image is no longer adequate in China, where the legal system is being updated and industrial criteria are catching up with the world's level," he said.

Peng Xizhe, professor of social sciences with Shanghai-based Fudan University, said that "transnational companies were once considered business examples, but many have been found of attempting to test the limit of Chinese laws and ethical principles."

German engineering powerhouse Siemens, under investigations over bribery and corruption allegations in Europe and the United States, sacked 20 employees in its China branch last year, saying they had been found to be related to things the company "doesn't want to accept."

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