In a move which hints at a fundamental shift at Foxconn, amid pressure from various quarters from within China and overseas, the Apple supplier has recently announced a 16 percent to 25 percent increase in the wages for the assembly line workers in its Chinese factories.

The announcement comes at a time when Foxconn is facing public scrutiny for the allegedly deplorable working conditions at its Chinese facilities. As a result of the increase, the monthly wages for Foxconn's workers in Shenzhen will increase to between 2200 yuan and 2500 yuan, from the current wage of 1800 yuan. While the change announced by Foxconn will further step up an already rapidly-changing Chinese economy, analysts are of the view that the actual impact of the reforms will largely depend on the effectiveness with which Foxconn can bring about a change in the economic scenario.

Over the last decade or so, the economic system in China has chiefly been attracting migrant workers to work at low salaries, and for long hours, at the massive manufacturing facilities where computers, smartphones, and other electronic goods are produced.

With the change in the economic system to be possible only if Foxconn, as well as its rivals and clients - including bigwig electronic forms like Apple, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell - convince customers that improving factories to benefit workers is worth the higher costs of electronic products, David Autor, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said: "This is the way capitalism is supposed to work. As nations develop, wages rise and life theoretically gets better for everyone."