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I guess what you say makes sense. Except for that first part - it was a bit hurtful what was said previously. USA did help the world get back on its feet. Never in history has a country treated the spoils of war like how USA did after WW2 - this demonstrated the goodness of America. With the atomic bomb demonstrated, USA could have taken over the entire world, but they didn't do that. It's worth remembering that past I think.

If safety and health regulations are at a higher standard in EU, I guess I can almost agree about the rationale for restricting imports - at least we can see the logic of it. Not good for business maybe. I think Trump won't like it.

To the topic of Apple though - I DO feel that the EU has so many regulations to draw from that it grabbed Billions of dollars from Apple by putting it under the magnifying glass a bit too harshly.

I believe I am starting to understand the Tariff plan.

Cause Tariff chaos. Tariff even the penguins in Antarctica to prevent any Tariff loopholes. Tear down the existing trade system. Get the Fed to drop interest rates. Refinance the national US debt a bit. Negotiate easily with the world to establish lower tariffs, perhaps getting closer to free trade, but with some catches so that USA has the edge and can have a chance to pay off it's unrecoverable position with the $37 Trillion debt. If they don't do that I guess it could get a LOT worse. Nobody likes this, but It's a big reset. The whole planet has to pitch in to pay the US national debt! Wow.
More like “Destroy all of our economic and military alliances and threaten to invade our allies”. These are the actions of a dictator.
 
It isn't a contradictory statement because you demonstrate it. "Unions are anathema to free market beliefs" is absolute nonsense and false. Truly free markets allow people to work together in collectives. Some of them are called companies. Others are called unions. Preventing people from forming collectives is not a free market. It is just a different government regulation. Or, are you really advocating that freedom is only free when you get to restrict the way others sell their labor? If so, it's quite Orwellian of you.

Oh that is such pap. I really question if you know what Orwellian means or understand the genesis of the word

No, I support people being able to work if they want and not be forced at the threat of violence to strike. Unions restrict labor and attempt to monopolize it, resulting in conditions that are NOT free market.

You need to get a refund on whatever you paid for your economic education. They lied to you and failed you.

"Unions insist on a minimum wage rate higher than what would be achieved for the given labor factor without the union. By doing so, they necessarily cut the number of men whom the employer can hire. Ergo, the consequence of their policy is to restrict the supply of labor, while at the same time they can piously maintain that they are inclusive and democratic, in contrast to the snobbish “aristocrats” of craft unionism."

Murray Rothbard
 
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Unions restrict labor and attempt to monopolize it, resulting in conditions that are NOT free market.
So do companies in ”free markets”.

See Microsoft and their Windows/Office software or Google in online search engines. And Apple with their monopolist App Store/In-App purchase policies.

And that’s not even mentioning concentration: When companies can take over others or merge, workers can unionise.

Corporate mergers restrict free trade, lower competition by monopolising and make markets less free. By your very own “only everyone fending for themselves is free (market)” logic.
 
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i
DOH!!! We just brought them back!

Here’s an idea. Maybe we shouldn’t break the current world economic system in the first place since it actually is working about as well as we could expect it to.

I guess the opposing view is that the current Reagan based economic system isn't working well. Maybe the thing most people are missing is servicing the US $37 TRILLION debt. That's a lot of interest!.

It seemed to be working fine because everyone kicks this can down the road - but it's frightening to service this much debt. Maybe impossible without printing more fiat USD. That is the definition of inflation!

Trump wants interest rates dropped immediately.

Shake the box with tariffs

Negotiate based on these tariff actions

Drop Interest rates

Refinance debt and get some more freedom to spend within the budget for a bit

Globalism comes to an end. Free trade can happen, but without as many barriers (real regulations or contrived).

EU has been sort of a proxy for China in some ways - so I guess this is the rationale for tariffs, even for Antarctic Island Penguins!
 
So do companies in ”free markets”.

See Microsoft and their Windows/Office software or Google in online search engines. And Apple with their monopolist App Store/In-App purchase policies.

And that’s not even mentioning concentration:
When companies can take over others or merge, workers can unionise.

I am not advocating for monopolies and I'm not for banning unions, nor am I defending legitimate bad practices. Your examples are flawed and not a valid comparison, but I'm leaving the office for the day and don't have time to elaborate.
 
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Your examples are flawed and not a valid comparison
And yet I stand by them:

Companies being free to form “unions” through mergers and acquisitions
is just the other side of the same coin as workers being free to form unions.

Unions insist on a minimum wage rate higher than what would be achieved for the given labor factor without the union
When corporations merge, say two banks or telecommunications companies in a local market, they routinely let go of employees when merging operations…
By doing so, they necessarily cut the number of men whom the employer can hire.
…reducing the number of men that get hired…

Ergo, the consequence of their policy is to restrict the supply of labor
…and the consequence of corporate mergers are a restriction of the demand for labour (in that sector/regional market).

Resulting in lower employment/wages than without that corporate merger in a less concentrated market.


“high labor market concentration goes hand in hand with low wages”
 
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More like “Destroy all of our economic and military alliances and threaten to invade our allies”. These are the actions of a dictator.

Well are the economic alliances damaged really? It's USA calling BS on all the restrictions and the customer is always right.

Military alliances? NATO was almost exclusively funded by USA! Instead of fighting about worldview stuff - this is a better way maybe. That's the rationale.

Executive orders from the US president ARE a lot like a dictatorship. Who started doing that stuff? I don't even know. Worth looking into it. Are there any benefits to a dictatorship? It is a dirty word right? Yet the last 5 presidents could not do anything about the USAiD waste and fraud - it did take a dictatorial style order to start cleaning up the obvious flagrant spending.

Anyways - it's all a bit off topic.

I do believe that it won't be cost effective for apple to produce iPhones in USA for a long while. It is time we appreciate the skills and craftsmanship of China's amazing factories. I see too much of the world going against China, especially the USA - and so much of it is unfair. But every pancake has 2 sides, and China using other countries to avoid tariffs would be unfair - so all countries get tariffs from USA I guess.
 
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So do companies in ”free markets”.

See Microsoft and their Windows/Office software or Google in online search engines. And Apple with their monopolist App Store/In-App purchase policies.
Actually, you stray off target when you try to grind your App Store axe. Stick to labor markets. Companies also attempt to restrict and monopolize labor in “free markets” through non-compete agreements, company raiding, wage fixing, no-poach agreements, etc.

Free markets don’t work without regulation. Truly free markets permit monopoly, oligopoly, collusion, information asymmetry, externalities, profiteering, etc. Once you have any regulation to establish acceptable market behavior, you no longer have a free market. Free market libertarians don’t want a free market, they just want their own brand of regulation, which typically denies worker freedom.
 
Oh that is such pap. I really question if you know what Orwellian means or understand the genesis of the word

No, I support people being able to work if they want and not be forced at the threat of violence to strike. Unions restrict labor and attempt to monopolize it, resulting in conditions that are NOT free market.

You need to get a refund on whatever you paid for your economic education. They lied to you and failed you.

"Unions insist on a minimum wage rate higher than what would be achieved for the given labor factor without the union. By doing so, they necessarily cut the number of men whom the employer can hire. Ergo, the consequence of their policy is to restrict the supply of labor, while at the same time they can piously maintain that they are inclusive and democratic, in contrast to the snobbish “aristocrats” of craft unionism."

Murray Rothbard

Murray Rothbard? LMAO. Okay. Your source is an anti-state anarchist who believes taxation is theft, the constitution and democracy are evil, and only property-owning "natural elites" should rule society.

That's fine. I'm happy to let you rest your case on an appeal to the authority of a crank.
 
I am a human being. I (think I) have lived my life reasonably well. I've worked to the benefit of my family and my community and my region. I do free stuff in my community. I do skilled (but occasionally paid stuff) for charities.

I've not had a monster cash handout from rich parents. Is that where I went wrong...?
 
And yet I stand by them:

Companies being free to form “unions” through mergers and acquisitions
is just the other side of the same coin as workers being free to form unions.


When corporations merge, say two banks or telecommunications companies in a local market, they routinely let go of employees when merging operations…

…reducing the number of men that get hired…


…and the consequence of corporate mergers are a restriction of the demand for labour (in that sector/regional market).

Resulting in lower employment/wages than without that corporate merger in a less concentrated market.


“high labor market concentration goes hand in hand with low wages”

Well you can stand by anything, doesn't make it right. Someone could stand by the statement "Pluto should still be a planet", but the IAU says otherwise. You can try to rebut Murray Rothbard, someone far beyond both of us in knowledge and intellect, but yes, free association means both parties can terminate the employment relationship. Proponents of unions seem to believe in compelled association and that's not a component of economic liberty.

You need more Austrian School and less Frankfurt School.
 
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Well you can stand by anything, doesn't make it right. Someone could stand by the statement "Pluto should still be a planet", but the IAU says otherwise. You can try to rebut Murray Rothbard, someone far beyond both of us in knowledge and intellect, but yes, free association means both parties can terminate the employment relationship. Proponents of unions seem to believe in compelled association and that's not a component of economic liberty.

You need more Austrian School and less Frankfurt School.
Unions.

Are they the converse of shareholders?
 
Murray Rothbard? LMAO. Okay. Your source is an anti-state anarchist who believes taxation is theft, the constitution and democracy are evil, and only property-owning "natural elites" should rule society.

That's fine. I'm happy to let you rest your case on an appeal to the authority of a crank.

A Socialist calling Rothbard a crank......that's rich. I guess Sowell and Friedman are "cranks" also, but you think Keynes, Marx, Engels, and contemporary leftists like Paul Krugman are the REAL "experts".

Taxation is theft.

We should all be "anti-state". The Founders warned us about consolidated power in an all powerful state. You might want to read up on them

Oh no, libertarian economist believes in libertarian economic principles. Call the papers.

You know a lot less about Rothbard and his beliefs than you think you do.

You're the exemplar of how the American Education System has completely failed to teach the truth about free market capitalism and instead perverts what it really is. You get poisoned to believe that things like "fairness" are only attainable through state power and regulation.
 
Please forward the information to Tim Cook, he needs proof that you can make bleeding edge tech in America on minimum wage as well as obtaining all the necessary components to assemble it from American suppliers. If your employer’s can do it, then so can Tim.
A straw man argument is a logical fallacy. You are arguing against what you wish I said as opposed to what I actually did.
Tim said that skilled labor did not exist to assemble iPhones in the US, and that China wasn't cheap labor. I said, yes skilled workers are in the US. Recall where Mac Pros were made when the re-announced the cheese grater. And, several of us have pointed out that it IS cheap labor compared to the US ($3/hour versus $20/hour US). This is exactly the kind of problem Trump is attempting to use tariffs to solve. Make it not cheaper to manufacture in China. One might argue it is the wrong tool or a tool being used incorrectly, but that is exactly the problem Trump is talking about solving. Acme takes manufacturing to China because it costs less to make it there. Uncle Sam says, well I will make it so expensive to sell it in your best market that it just makes sense to make t locally. China, and 170 other countries, do the same thing.

Arrange a sit-down with Tim Cook and myself, and I will gladly tell him all about it. I have some other ideas I would like to pitch to him about improving Apple Photos and Apple TV while I am at it. I am sure it would be a wonderful exchange.

I am not a Cook hater. I have defended him more than griped at him. He just made a factually incorrect statement.
 
Trump doesn't care about illegal drugs and overdoses, he pardoned Ross Ulbricht on Jan 21,2025. Ross Ulbricht was already in jail on a life sentence. Ross Ulbricht was running the silk road, an illegal website selling drugs and using the USPS to ship them out.

It’s far more complicated than that. Ask yourself, why does the government get to choose which drugs are legal and which are not? Why is it that gambling is illegal in most states yet those same states can peddle lottery tickets?

Libertarians are extremely distrustful of the government precisely because they are hypocrites and have historically been the most oppressive force throughout human history: Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Castro, etc. have proven that. They believe that they should be free to put anything in their bodies and the govt should stay the hell out of their business.

Ulbricht was such a person and yes, he created a means for people to buy/sell illegal drugs as a F U to the govt.

Trump is also for smaller govt so he has something in common with libertarians though he’s obviously not one. During his campaign, the libertarian party begged him to release Ulbricht because they didn’t think creating what is essentially a digital equivalent of a dark alleyway should warrant being put in prison for life. Furthermore, the entire case against Ulbricht was incredibly suspect.

Trump looked into and agreed with them and made a promise to pardon Ulbricht and he kept it.

Did Ulbricht deserve to have the slate wiped completely clean by a full presidential pardon instead of a commutation that would have left his conviction in place but sprung him from prison? Perhaps not.

But is it justice for him to grow old and die in prison while sticky-fingered federal agents who corrupted the investigation and disgraced their badges walk free after serving their vastly less punitive sentences? Emphatically not.
 
Oh that is such pap. I really question if you know what Orwellian means or understand the genesis of the word

No, I support people being able to work if they want and not be forced at the threat of violence to strike. Unions restrict labor and attempt to monopolize it, resulting in conditions that are NOT free market.

You need to get a refund on whatever you paid for your economic education. They lied to you and failed you.

"Unions insist on a minimum wage rate higher than what would be achieved for the given labor factor without the union. By doing so, they necessarily cut the number of men whom the employer can hire. Ergo, the consequence of their policy is to restrict the supply of labor, while at the same time they can piously maintain that they are inclusive and democratic, in contrast to the snobbish “aristocrats” of craft unionism."

Murray Rothbard

There it is, quoting an alt-right Libertarian friend of the Koch bros, Holocaust deniers and David Duke.

One can't separate his reprehensible politics from his anti-union Liberertarianism, and he probably wouldn't have wanted anyone to. But you know if one is really a Libertarian, then it's none of their business whether someone else joins a union or not. Personal freedoms and all, right?
 
Don’t like unions? Don’t join one. But who are you to decide the lives of other people who want to join one? Who appointed you king?
By that same token, why should I be forced to join a union should I not want to? Unions for retail are laughable. You are utterly expendable. You want better pay? Go out and look for something other than flipping burgers and swiping a credit card.
 
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Well you can stand by anything, doesn't make it right. Someone could stand by the statement "Pluto should still be a planet", but the IAU says otherwise
Planets aren’t involved in economic exchange and markets.
This has got nothing to do with unions.
You can try to rebut Murray Rothbard, someone far beyond both of us in knowledge and intellect
A mere appeal to authority is not a reasoned argument.
Proponents of unions seem to believe in compelled association and that's not a component of economic liberty.
No, they believe in freedom of association, “both an individual right and a collective right, guaranteed by all modern and democratic legal systems, including the United States Bill of Rights”. (Wikipedia)

If a few proponents of unions do, that does not allow for generalisation - and the United States and its courts of law protect individuals from compelled association with Unions.
free association means both parties can terminate the employment relationship
…or join organisations to further their interests.

why should I be forced to join a union should I not want to?
You should be free to but not required.
I haven’t read anyone here advocating compulsory membership.

Unions for retail are laughable. You are utterly expendable.
If retail unions were totally laughable, companies - including Apple - wouldn’t spend so much time, money, effort and lawyers at busting them.

Unions make employees less expendable, and that is the point of the Union:
Unionised workers and employees do not want be “utterly expendable”.

Very few human beings do.
 
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Is it possible ….YES
Is it reality……. No

Manufacturing iPhones in the USA would be cost prohibitive. ( minimum wage , hiring a million people, unions etc would make this unrealistic) Maybe as bad as the tariffs
 
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A Socialist calling Rothbard a crank......that's rich. I guess Sowell and Friedman are "cranks" also, but you think Keynes, Marx, Engels, and contemporary leftists like Paul Krugman are the REAL "experts".

Taxation is theft.

We should all be "anti-state". The Founders warned us about consolidated power in an all powerful state. You might want to read up on them

Oh no, libertarian economist believes in libertarian economic principles. Call the papers.

You know a lot less about Rothbard and his beliefs than you think you do.

You're the exemplar of how the American Education System has completely failed to teach the truth about free market capitalism and instead perverts what it really is. You get poisoned to believe that things like "fairness" are only attainable through state power and regulation.

Tariffs are a tax.

You are right, a Democracies and the State of Law is not incompatible with Libertarianism. In my view was actually Libertarianism that gave birth to Democracy and the State of Law, remaining the individual suffrage as the way to establish the law. Before, the a pure libertarian mechanism was in place. I don't remember having read America being that great, it provided the background for nice movies though.

Now, I do agree that free market and sound money (like the gold standard) is the way. I also believe in the free market.
 
I guess what you say makes sense. Except for that first part - it was a bit hurtful what was said previously. USA did help the world get back on its feet. Never in history has a country treated the spoils of war like how USA did after WW2 - this demonstrated the goodness of America. With the atomic bomb demonstrated, USA could have taken over the entire world, but they didn't do that. It's worth remembering that past I think.
Perhaps you should try to see this from our point of view then. Don’t you think it is “hurtful” to see the US tell us we should be grateful to you for what you did for us the past century, while you **** all over the history of the past millennium? You want to talk about “hurtful”, while saying Denmark, who lost more people per capita in US wars the last three decades than US did, is a “bad partner”?

Denmark, by the way, did not take back all the ground we lost to Germany in 1864, when we had the chance after WWI. Instead, we held an election to allow the people living there to decide whether they wanted to be Danish or German. Just like Greenland is free to become it’s own country as soon as they themselves decides to (which they do far haven’t, because they can’t function without the support from Denmark). We should be “grateful” to US that you didn’t forcefully take over the world when you had the chance, extending the most deadly war in history into a world destroying one? Give me a break.

It’s exactly this kind of American arrogance combined with ignorance, that makes the rest of the world despise you instead of admire you, and is right now hurting America from the inside.
 
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Oh that is such pap. I really question if you know what Orwellian means or understand the genesis of the word

No, I support people being able to work if they want and not be forced at the threat of violence to strike. Unions restrict labor and attempt to monopolize it, resulting in conditions that are NOT free market.

You need to get a refund on whatever you paid for your economic education. They lied to you and failed you.

"Unions insist on a minimum wage rate higher than what would be achieved for the given labor factor without the union. By doing so, they necessarily cut the number of men whom the employer can hire. Ergo, the consequence of their policy is to restrict the supply of labor, while at the same time they can piously maintain that they are inclusive and democratic, in contrast to the snobbish “aristocrats” of craft unionism."

Murray Rothbard
Unions are the main reason the working class in Scandinavia is in a much better spot financially and socially than the working class in the US. Does it hurt the factory owners? Sure. Does it benefit the population? Hell yeah. Who do you want to improve the lives of: The factory worker, or the factory owner?

I’m guessing your answer will be that the factory will shut down and the worker will be out of a job. But that just doesn’t align with reality, when the fact is that unemployment is low even though the amount of factory workers is down.
 
A straw man argument is a logical fallacy. You are arguing against what you wish I said as opposed to what I actually did.
Tim said that skilled labor did not exist to assemble iPhones in the US, and that China wasn't cheap labor. I said, yes skilled workers are in the US. Recall where Mac Pros were made when the re-announced the cheese grater. And, several of us have pointed out that it IS cheap labor compared to the US ($3/hour versus $20/hour US). This is exactly the kind of problem Trump is attempting to use tariffs to solve. Make it not cheaper to manufacture in China. One might argue it is the wrong tool or a tool being used incorrectly, but that is exactly the problem Trump is talking about solving. Acme takes manufacturing to China because it costs less to make it there. Uncle Sam says, well I will make it so expensive to sell it in your best market that it just makes sense to make t locally. China, and 170 other countries, do the same thing.

Arrange a sit-down with Tim Cook and myself, and I will gladly tell him all about it. I have some other ideas I would like to pitch to him about improving Apple Photos and Apple TV while I am at it. I am sure it would be a wonderful exchange.

I am not a Cook hater. I have defended him more than griped at him. He just made a factually incorrect statement.
You denounced straw man arguments then proceeded to make a huge one yourself. The problem is not that skilled workers don’t exist, and Tim Cook never claimed that. It is that they don’t exist at the scale required to manufacture iPhones (and all the other made in China phones, which we seem to forget exist, in higher numbers combined than iPhone).

It’s as simple as that.
 
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