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Trump Demands US iPhone Production, Threatens 25% Tariff

repoman016 said:
Thank you and very informative. I like everything except the last part. You could argue technology was as expensive as it was because of supply and demand. Over time, tech usually becomes cheaper (look at TV's)
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Technology became so cheap in a large part because production shifted overwhelming to Asia with a lower cost.

Also, to provide a link about Apple's historic profit margins: https://www.washingtonpost.com/arch...d-apple/6a05586d-f3de-4991-b0bb-944ac59ee44e/

"From 1981 to 1991, Apple's gross margins ranged from 42 percent of sales to more than 53 percent."

Again, early Apple was about high margins. Apple is still about high margins. Apple has mostly maintained those margins over its entire history (with lower ones for a while in the 2000s before they picked up in later 2000s and early 2010s). Whether someone agrees with a margins-focused business plan is personal economic ideology. I simply point this out to clarify that Apple has always been a higher margins company. Tim Cook didn't instill this business model into Apple, it was that way from the beginning.
 
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avkills said:
Where exactly are you going to find the labor to do it? The TSMC plant being built in Arizona is way past when it was supposed to be done; quite simply because we don't have the necessary skilled labor to even build it, let alone operate it.

Also any new large scale manufacturing is going to be automated and robotic.
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The plant opened earlier this year. They did have to staff it with a lot of engineers from Taiwan though.
 
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poorcody said:
The plant opened earlier this year. They did have to staff it with a lot of engineers from Taiwan though.
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As a nation, that's your problem and the general problem with a globalist mindset. You lose the key skills in the native population as it's all just imported instead.
 
MacRumors said:


President Donald Trump escalated his trade rhetoric Friday, targeting Apple with a potential 25% tariff unless the company manufactures iPhones domestically rather than anywhere else.

Apple-iPhone-16-family-lineup.jpg

The warning came via Truth Social after CEO Tim Cook announced earlier this month that Indian facilities would handle the majority of U.S. iPhone sales. Apple's pivot to India was widely seen as a strategy to sidestep Chinese manufacturing amid ongoing trade tensions.
The U.S. president brought up the issue just last week during his Middle East trip. "I had a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday," Trump said during his state visit to Qatar. "He is building all over India."

Apple had reportedly planned to source all 60+ million annual US iPhone sales from India by late 2026. Meanwhile, key supplier Foxconn is investing $1.5 billion to expand Indian production, including a display module facility near Chennai.

The threat sent Apple shares tumbling 3% in pre-market trading Friday.

Trump's demand would force a major shift from Apple's current manufacturing strategy, which relies heavily on Asian suppliers for cost efficiency and established supply chains. Moving iPhone production to the U.S. would likely require massive infrastructure investments and could substantially increase device costs, but there's simply no way Apple could pull off the transition. According to Wedbush, producing iPhones in the U.S. could push prices to ~$3,500 and take 5–10 years to implement, making it unfeasible.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Article Link: Trump Demands US iPhone Production, Threatens 25% Tariff
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What the media rarely mentions: wages in the U.S. have been stagnant since 1979. Meanwhile, millionaires & billionaires have multiplied.





Yes, iPhones can be built in the U.S.—Americans would do those jobs if wages were fair. Outsourcing isn’t about skill or willingness. It’s about cheap labor & lower living standards abroad. It’s about profit, not necessity.
 
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smirking said:
It’s way more than the labor costs. The whole frickin supply chain is in China. They spent decades building it up.
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Great, so Apple is building up Chinas military just because Americans want cheaper phones and shareholders want more profits. Another example of why capootalism doesn’t function. You are actively funding the opposition lol and now we are going to fund India another behemoth
 
Half the people in this thread would be doing backflips down the street and throwing block parties if the CCP mandated huawei, etc they need to manufacture in mainland China or face consequences…the hypocrisy is astounding.
 
Trump believes it's time for all Americans to go back to the good old days where everyone worked on a farm, in a factory, or in a mine. He wants us to get back to those good old old days.

He ignores information technology, AI, medical research, etc., particularly with his attack on education and innovation.

The man is single handedly destroying America, and not one Republican has opposed him.

The world has changed. His mind decays.
 
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WarmWinterHat said:
I know there is line work here in the US, and I'm saying it's boring and repetitive. We don't need more of it. I have several family members who work for Ford on the lines...if it wasn't for pay that rivals my healthcare salary, they wouldn't be doing it.

Trump is very, very anti-union, as are most US companies. It wouldn't pay well.
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Who said work can’t be boring and repetitive? Almost no one goes to work bc it’s fun. Such a ridiculous notion lol
 
Arran said:
Education, Education, Education, which leads to Innnovation! Innovation! Innovation! It’s a long game but that’s the future.

Instead, Trump is trying to strangle Education so he can wind the clock back to the 1980’s and look relevant again. It’s all about feeding his ego.

The man has no vision. None whatsoever. The future is not the past. The future needs to be invented anew. Yes, it’s hard.
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More like the 1880s :/
 
We have had record low unemployment the last few years, and were deporting millions of immigrants. If we get millions of new manufacturing jobs, who is going to work the jobs that they replace?
 
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BaldiMac said:
We have had record low unemployment the last few years, and were deporting millions of immigrants. If we get millions of new manufacturing jobs, who is going to work the jobs that they replace?
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Keep in mind the many many imaginary skilled unemployed people. They could work at new factories (assuming of course those factories are likewise imaginary).
 
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BaldiMac said:
We have had record low unemployment the last few years, and were deporting millions of immigrants. If we get millions of new manufacturing jobs, who is going to work the jobs that they replace?
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I think the Trump admin is hoping to pull a Mao and send all the scientists they fired to do this and ignore their expertise
 
leonremi said:
Probably not.
Don the orange clown can get easily corrupted (he's loudly begging for it) but I don't think he can STAY corrupted.
He doesn't have enough honor or morals for that.
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Oh you think one bribe wouldn't be enough? I think you're right.

It'd be more of a (felonious) subscription model: Bribes paid monthly. Protection racket.
 
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