Hershey not so sweet for foreign student workers

An unidentified student protests the working conditions at a Hershey Co. warehouse operated by Exel Wednesday, August, 17, 2011. (AP Photo/The Patriot-News, John C. Whitehead)

HERSHEY, Pa. (AP) — Foreign students working at a candy warehouse protested conditions and pay for a second day Thursday, chanting on Chocolate Avenue under streetlights shaped like Hershey’s Kisses, arguing that they were employed under the guise of a cultural exchange but toil away in what amounts to a sweets sweatshop. The State Department said it was investigating.

More than 100 students gathered in touristy downtown Hershey, home to the nation’s second-largest candy maker, complaining of hard physical labor, steep pay deductions for rent that often left them with little spending money, and no cultural enrichment. They said their concerns were met with threats of deportation.