The strike could help Honda end up with a younger work force with fewer family obligations to distract them. Most visitors to the tent were enthusiastically welcomed by the four recruiters.

The strikers here had wanted to match the raises of up to 50 percent, to as much as $234 a month in addition free dormitory housing, reportedly obtained by workers at a transmission plant in nearby Foshan nearly two weeks ago. But they appear to have miscalculated on an important point. Transmission plants are highly automated operations that require skilled employees. The transmission factory workers in Foshan mostly have the Chinese equivalent of community college degrees in subjects like mechanical engineering.

By contrast, the factory here assembles door locks, rear and side mirrors, and other low-value products. One recruiter at the recruitment tent said that Honda only required a junior high school education for applicants.

Honda is still trying to lure back strikers, however. A large sign at the factory gates said that last Wednesday through Saturday, the days when the factory was closed because of the strike, would be counted as paid work days. Management also offered double pay for hours worked on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, as the factory tries to catch up.

Striking workers who do not return by the end of the day on Tuesday will be dealt with according to national labor laws, the factory notice said. The laws allow the dismissal of employees who do not show up for work.

A young woman who came to the factory gates looking for work on Sunday said that she had traveled two hours by bus after hearing by phone from a friend that Honda was hiring and offered better working conditions than many factories.

“I can’t stand the 12-hour shifts at other factories,” she said. “Here it’s only eight hours.”

The crumbling of the strike shows that employers and the authorities retain powerful options in the face of rising labor unrest.