Apple pays $5 per manufactured iPhone in China. Around $8-$10 in India. There’s no reason that it couldn’t be made for $40 in the USA.
It’s mostly machines making these things. Yes there’s talent, but AAPL isn’t willing to pay anyone except its executives. The executives take in hundreds of millions per year in stock alone. Everyone gets screwed. China, Apple employees, and every stakeholders who isn’t a shareholder. Tim cares about his buddies and his shareholders.
All the CEOs who shipped the jobs outside the USA to make money did it due to greed not because the USA couldn’t manufacture it. The military and the contractors can make stealth bombers but they couldn’t make an iPhone in the USA? Give me a break. Tim is a Crook and so are all the politicians and CEOs!
Putting aside the absurd proposition that an iPhone costs Apple $5 (as tough as that is), your numbers mean Apple’s costs have risen 8x. How exactly do you expect American consumers to afford that?