When the daily rhythm of factory work at Wuxi New District winds down, thousands of labourers file out of the rectangular buildings housing the production line of Sharp, the Japanese electronics group, to return to their living quarters.

In a female dormitory amid abandoned warehouses, some read romance novels entitled Sweetheart Garden and Thick Feeling Love, borrowed from a fruit stall for Rmb0.5 a day. Others sit huddled around a television in an open eating area, some in pyjamas well before 6pm.