Whoa, this could be the start of something catastrophic for the already failing Chinese economy. Hopefully China comes to the table because their cycle of: open market to U.S. company, IP theft, pushing company out of China via fines and corrupt legal system, repeat… all while manipulating the currency and oppressing their own citizens, has to end.
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Report: Apple Plans to Source All US-Bound iPhones From India by 2026
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Only 20% of the world IPhone market is in the United States. Foxconn, which is a Taiwanese company, will still make IPhones for the rest of the world in China and while US market assembly is moving to India, IPhone components will still be made in China. The way around tariffs is to have final assembly occur in lower tariff countries, like India.
I don’t believe you understand how severe this is. First, the market is over 30%, not 20%, almost 1/3rd of all production, in 2024, it was 35%. By far Apple’s largest single-country market.
• U.S.: ~66–76 million units, 33–35% of global sales, $60–70 billion revenue.
• EU: ~44 million units, ~20% of global sales, $40–45 billion revenue.
• China: ~40–50 million units, 20–22% (down from 28% in 2023), $35–45 billion revenue.
• India: 12–12.5 million units, 5–6%, $10–10.7 billion revenue.
• Japan: 15–20 million units, 7–9%, $13.5–20 billion revenue.
India is expected to grow to 20% of iPhone sales by 2026/2027.
This is possibly just the catalyst as many companies have been searching for diversification away from China since COVID in 2020 and have been experimenting with a diversified manufacturing model.
The impact of this move is estimated to be catastrophic for China (whose economy is already teetering): Analyst are estimating potential GDP hit of $1-5 BILLION from this move. At Foxconn’s Zhengzhou plant for iPhone assembly, a rough estimate suggests 100,000 to 500,000 jobs could be at risk due to this move. This is on top of the losses from the production that was already moved to India as of last year ($22 billion was shifted from China to India).
If Apple starts to move other manufacturing from China? Say, the iPads or the rumored move of some Macs to Mexico? That would place a huge stress on China’s already high unemployment, which was 20% among youth in 2020, the last year China put out numbers because they were getting so bad.
Now what if other major companies also increasingly move to Mexico, India, etc.? Some China analysts predict a deep depression with China having to delve into their currency reserves to manage.
If you want to see the effects of the Tariffs, look at AliExpress.
Fortunately, I already have 2 FiiO BTR17 purchased last January.
China’s incredible changes due to tariffs are astounding! Young people laid off are starting businesses, many in street food. Street food in China has a reputation. Until recently, elderly survivors of the Cultural Revolution ran food carts, known for their unsafe and low-quality food, even using sewage oil. But the 30-year-old owners are different. Their carts are spotless, the food fresh and delicious, just like in Japan. The Chinese Communist Party must be worried about these young business owners taking responsibility for their lives. It’s a significant shift!
Fortunately, I already have 2 FiiO BTR17 purchased last January.
China’s incredible changes due to tariffs are astounding! Young people laid off are starting businesses, many in street food. Street food in China has a reputation. Until recently, elderly survivors of the Cultural Revolution ran food carts, known for their unsafe and low-quality food, even using sewage oil. But the 30-year-old owners are different. Their carts are spotless, the food fresh and delicious, just like in Japan. The Chinese Communist Party must be worried about these young business owners taking responsibility for their lives. It’s a significant shift!
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Specialty stuff, sure, where there's a small market willing to pay high prices for very specialized gear. But we're talking about the iPhone here - it's nothing even remotely resembling niche - they're assembling well over half a million of them every day - today half a million, tomorrow another half a million... - if you take a day off, you'll need to do well over one million the next day. It's absolutely mind boggling that they can build such a complex device to such consistently high tolerances, in such enormous quantities. I think most people have no idea just how massive the manufacturing infrastructure is in China.
And yeah, R&D / software development and such is an area where the US excels, and is generally high paid, but it would be difficult to argue that those are the massive numbers of "factory jobs" / onshore manufacturing that the administration is talking about.
Design and development takes thousands of people. Assembly (including gathering all the resources and doing all the subassembly) takes millions of people. And that is what the administration says it wants to bring to the US. I stand by my assertion that if iPhone manufacturing does return to the US, it'll be in the form of a massively automated / robotic manufacturing operation that employs thousands of Americans, not the hundreds of thousands or millions that Trump keeps implying (what he's doing is selling a fantasy to a section of the country that feels left behind and wants to go back to an imagined "better time" in the past - like assuring people there will be comfortable reassuring jobs in "clean coal" instead of training them to work in the solar industry, where we're ceding a lot of ground to China - with them not realizing that history only moves forward, and that that imagined past is a fantasy as well). America doesn't have hundreds of thousands of highly skilled but unemployed machinists and such who are willing to relocate to a newly built factory city. We don't teach those skills to huge numbers of people these days. And spinning up that kind of resource pool is going to take decades, not months (but, sure, let's start the protectionist tariffs now - facepalm).
Personally, I think Apple would be better off, and more resilient against pandemics, natural disasters, and geopolitics, if it had manufacturing plants (again, probably highly automated) on every continent - less shipping, less importing, and if one facility melts down, others can share the burden. Put a big plant in the US. And another in Europe. And another in South America. And so on.
Sorry MAGA, the glorious sweatshop and grueling factory labor that you dream about will not make a comeback. America is a service economy and will not revert to 1925 manufacturing. AI, IT support, software, financial, robotics manufacturing and digital entertainment is this century’s economic engine.
And healthcare. With our aging populace, healthcare and eldercare are and will continue to be a huge part of the U.S. economy.
Steinway is probably the best example of American manufacture. As far as I can tell, all the parts are made in the US although Steinway also have a factory in Hamburg which nominally makes the same instruments. Each location's production has its afficionados.
When it comes to wind instruments, flutes seem to be successful in the US and, at one point, decades ago, saxophones. However, French and Japanese manufacturers now reign supreme and there is no sign of the US ever catching up.
The message I take away is that countries have their own specialisms. pretending it can all come back to the US is naive and is something perhaps only a politician could daydream about.
When it comes to wind instruments, flutes seem to be successful in the US and, at one point, decades ago, saxophones. However, French and Japanese manufacturers now reign supreme and there is no sign of the US ever catching up.
The message I take away is that countries have their own specialisms. pretending it can all come back to the US is naive and is something perhaps only a politician could daydream about.
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China's economy is not teetering. This tariff BS will only strengthen it as countries look to abandon the unstable and unreliable US for them.
Why? Do you think every major business leader on earth purposely went abroad for manufacturing because it was less cost effective and efficient? People who say we should just start making everything here remind me of this meme:
And their cheapest piano is like $35,000… compared to $5000 for an upright Indonesian Yamaha or Kawai.
We can’t seem to make anything here without a 4 or 5 figure price tag. That’s fine for cars and Steinway pianos… not so much for a tshirt or guitar or iPhone.
And I believe Fender make their guitars all over the world and it’s only the most expensive ones that are made in America. $1000 and upwards.
Trump's Taylor Made golf clubs and Foot Joy shoes are made in China.
Yeah, I’m not sure where people are getting that narrative from.
It must be getting pushed on right wing circles in hopes it would make Trump look like he’s smart here.
Indeed.
Trump is trying to re-live his glory days from the 1980's. He made lots of noise back then, but to little effect because he couldn't grasp how the world was changing. Fast forward to now and he's still stubbornly trying to make a point that expired four decades ago.
He can sign as many Executive Orders as he likes today but, "Tempora mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis".
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My purchasing is very much influenced by the consensus of other experienced users. I'm a professional clarinettist and most players buy French instruments. The modern French clarinet produced by a company named Buffet started life with the same company in 1839. Yamaha copied many of their models and have now branched out and become established in their own right. America never really got close on this, at least in professional circles. However, if it's pianos and I have £250,000 spare I will be buying a Steinway, but probably from their Hamburg location. Others will go with the models from New York. At this price point Yamaha, Bosendorfer and Kawai do compete but Steinway still rule the day in most corners of the globe.
I would love it if my phone could be made in the UK or somewhere in Europe but it would then cost £5k I would imagine. In the UK sock manufacturers stopped producing once imports took over so I hardly think cost-conscious consumers will pay £5k for a phone. I suspect that much the same applies to the US. High-end yes, middle and low-end no.
I would love it if my phone could be made in the UK or somewhere in Europe but it would then cost £5k I would imagine. In the UK sock manufacturers stopped producing once imports took over so I hardly think cost-conscious consumers will pay £5k for a phone. I suspect that much the same applies to the US. High-end yes, middle and low-end no.
Wow, what a fantasy land you are living in. The Chinese economy has never recovered from its Zero Covid policy. The real estate industry has all but collapsed. The practice of purchasing apartments before the building has even started construction, construction that never starts, has bankrupted 100s of 1000's of people. Uncompleted Tofu Dreg buildings that have collapsed. The tariffs have put millions out of work in China. Orders are being canceled, factories have shut down, and warehouses are full of unsold exports. The Chinese people are protesting what has happened. Taiwan, and Japanese professors who study China and the CCP think that Xi Jinping is close to being deposed. 195 countries are in talks with the US to make trade deals. Their local industries have been destroyed by Cheap Chinese imports. China is the most hated nation on the planet.
It wouldn't surprise me if in the halls of power in Beijing, there was a lot of confidence that the Chinese system and the Chinese people can endure more pain, economic pain, than Americans can, than Donald Trump can, because he ran on this platform of bringing inflation down on day one. And if you cut off all products from China, one guaranteed outcome is that prices of stuff is going to go up.
The Great Leap Forward shows how much the Chinese can endure, how cold blooded the Chinese government can be. We can't compete with that. Deprive us of 3 meals and we'll go Lord of the Flies in short order.
How did you come by that last statement?
You don't try to point out facts to a Wumao.
What choice did the Chinese people have during "The Great Leap Forward"? It is one of the greatest famines in Human history. The Association for Asian Studies estimates that as many as 55 million died of starvation between 1960 and 1962. During the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976, 1.5 million died.
What choice did the African people have during "The Great Slave Trade"? It is one of the greatest atrocities in Human history. Not sure of the number estimates, I'll check but if you add the death and devastation actually left behind in Africa to this day by the Americans, (others involved too yes). then consider the 'legacy' left in some of the US population why would they not be the most hated nation on the planet?
Regarding the Chinese mindset specifically though;
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