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How China Built ‘iPhone City’ with Billions in Perks for Apple’s Partner

109 points by sr_banksy 10y ago

ruminasean 10y ago
They've put pretty typical Apple-esque levels of effort into the entire chain, including financial shenanigans that got them in trouble with the EU. It'll be interesting to see whether they can make good on their promise to onshore some of their manufacturing.
siculars 10y ago
Beyond iPhone in China, I have a larger question. Let's say I were building product in the US with child labor in unsafe conditions not adhering to US laws and regulations. Would I be allowed to sell that product in the US? Probably not. If I were doing similarly around the world then seeking to sell that product in the US, it happens to be the case that I could. Why is that the case? Why is it that product built in foreign countries that do not adhere to US laws and regulations on manufacturing and labor are allowed to be sold in the US?
- ue_ 10y ago
  Because that's capitalism in today's world. It's the "free market" at work. I don't think the focus should be on preventing people from using "bad labour" but rather on making it so that there would be no reason to use "bad labour". As much as people on HN especially would be so critical of Socialism, they often shy away from these topics - beacuse they are uncomfortable to think about. The fact of the matter is that it's not good for business - neither for the people in government, nor for Apple, to be force Apple to make their products where there is some guarantee that the workers are being treated fairly. It's worse for Apple, of course, but politicians don't want to lose their lobbying money or their power. Lots of people will be saying "it's horrible what they're doing" without realising the cause - the unustainable model of global capitalism that is forever requiring higher and higher returns. Such growth for this kind of labour is much harder to accomplish where it costs more, such as in the US.
  - tornadoboy55 10y ago
    > As much as people on HN especially would be so critical of Socialism Where do you get this from? Pretty much everyone from Europe is very grateful for the various safety nets the countries have built up there, especially in West-Europe.
    - TheBeardKing 10y ago
      It seems to have flipped as attitudes in Silicon Valley have flipped. Majority used to be Ron Paul supporters, now those attitudes seem to have matured to a more nuanced worldview.
  - berntb 10y ago
    This article by Krugman changed my world view: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_dismal_science/1997/03/in_praise_of_cheap_labor.html http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_dismal_science/19... It is almost 20 years old and notes that industrialization and modernization is a process. It doesn't really work for a country to get rich without climbing it [edit: except free money, like with oil], including simple jobs in the beginning -- and now China is doing it. In my book, it is good for humanity with a billion less horribly poor people. It doesn't feel bad to be on the other side of that, because of ideology?
    - muninn_ 10y ago
      Thanks for posting this. It's incredibly Euro-centric to sit here and complain about the perceived child/human rights abuses that happen in China when those very exact things are what industrialized Europe. I really wish we would all just spend more time focusing on our countries and improving our quality of life through trade and the free exchange of ideas. Other countries don't have to listen to our lessons or advice, or our experience, but being critical gets us nowhere.
      - ue_ 10y ago
        >It's incredibly Euro-centric to sit here and complain about the perceived child/human rights abuses that happen in China when those very exact things are what industrialized Europe. It's also incredibly Euro-centric to be thinking that other countries ought to be following the path Europe and the US took to capitalism, and then to say that these countries should be implementing it in such a way that there's the same worker exploitation everywhere. Worker exploitation isn't some thing in the past. It doesn't just happen in China, it's happening all the time and everywhere. But the case of it is so readily apparent in China it ought to be a case against worker exploitation as a whole. Yet some people still say "nevermind these countries, they're just on their way to being like us". We do not stop to question whether being like Europe is actually beneficial?
- intralizee 10y ago
  I believe one of Apple's higher ups has talked about child labor before. I'm not sure if it was Steve or Tim but the convo was that its impossible to handle without hurting the communities because the norm is child labor over there. So the conditions for the children are worse if they have no labor. It's really complicated and not something that you can judge from an arm chair position, you have to go over there and see it with your own eyes.
  - bisby 10y ago
    If you have a family of 6 (lets assume 2 parents and 4 kids) all working for 50 cents an hour. Saying "your kids have to go to school and not work" and then paying the adults 3 dollars an hour. The family winds up making more money without the kids having to work. (in this admittedly limited example, the family makes double) If you take the kids out of the equation without increasing the parental pay, then yes, you'll have a harder time with things, as the family just lost 66% of their income, which will mean cutting back. So you are correct that it is complicated and "stop kids from working" isn't the FULL answer. But it doesn't mean that there aren't solutions - plenty of countries have child labor laws without falling apart.
    - SanFranManDan 10y ago
      So now the cost of labor went up 6x? Don't you see a problem in that solution? The people only have jobs because labor is so cheap. Other countries don't have child labor laws because their job market evolved and pushed the low labor cost jobs into other countries.
      - bisby 10y ago
        I agree that labor cost is going to go up. And the whole point of this being enforced from the US side through tariffs and import regulations is so that when country A enacts child labor laws, Apple doesn't just move to country B. And I'm aware that it's a complicated, sensitive topic. That was my point. But dismissing it entirely because solution X creates problem Y instead of finding solution Y (which probably causes problem Z, which will have a solution eventually too) is not the right answer. Saying "Well we just can't solve this problem, they get to live in squalor and there's NOTHING that can be done to help them" is ridiculous.
- xenadu02 10y ago
  Maybe we shouldn't allow that. Perhaps we should apply a tax to adjust for environmental and labor impact. I imagine it would be $0 from Europe. A medium tax from China to account for the complete lack of environmental regulation. A high tax for products from places like Bangladesh. There is nothing that says we have to allow for free trade. It certainly hasn't been a net-benefit to the United States itself.
  - vtange 10y ago
    But wouldn't that just burden American businesses against foreign competitors? It would make it so Americans would quit offshoring and simply incorporate outside of U.S. jurisdiction. That or lose to Chinese businesses that are less regulated and are thus free to be "more innovative"
    - sbov 10y ago
      How does incorporating somewhere else help? Tariffs are applied to imported goods, and presumably how said "high tax" would be applied. It doesn't matter where the company is incorporated.
    - gertef 10y ago
      It would level the playing field for all businesses. Incorporating outside the US wouldn't help the companies get access to US markets
- wcummings 10y ago
  Foxconn obviously isn't perfect but like 99.99% of their workforce is old enough to work legally.
- jonknee 10y ago
  > Why is it that product built in foreign countries that do not adhere to US laws and regulations on manufacturing and labor are allowed to be sold in the US? Because of our trade rules. Modern trade agreements are pretty much about mandating labor/environmental regulations and respect of IP (mainly pharma/movies/music) in exchange for easier access to the the US market.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- sfifs 10y ago
  Question - when the US, Europe and Japan were industrializing from 1880s through 1960s and dragged everyone into disastrous wars, did any other market complain about worker safety or abuse or pollution (the famous London fog etc.) and refuse to buy products? When now other nations are going through an industrialization phase that's actually far more respectful of worker rights than the West's industrialization was, why complain?
  - manarth 10y ago
    "did any other market complain about worker safety or abuse or pollution and refuse to buy products?" Pre-industrial revolution, living conditions were pretty poor working conditions were pretty poor life expectancy was pretty poor, so it wasn't exactly making things worse. Despite all the problems caused by industrialisation, it was still a net positive. Now that we've progressed through industrialisation to a point where life expectancy has dramatically improved, along with living conditions and all the rest, it's given us a point of comparison. Countries that are going through an industrialisation phase aren't being criticised in comparison to a pre-industrialisation state, they're being criticised in comparison to what other post-industrialised countries have achieved. Sure, it's an unfair comparison, but the first time around, that comparison didn't exist.
  - gertef 10y ago
    Indonesian people weren't buying Europe's products and reaping the benefits of the London smog, modern US/European/Japanese people are enjoying the benefits of modern exploitative labor in Indonesia. What gives you the illusion that other nations are more respectful of worker rights than the US/EU was in the past? China's cities are poisoned with smog today, for just one example.
- manarth 10y ago
  "Would I be allowed to sell that product in the US? Probably not." I can't think of any legal reason why not. If the product meets US electrical/safety standards, and isn't in breach of IP such as patents, sure, it could be sold. Whether anyone would buy it is a different question: I wouldn't be surprised if a product built in such a way were boycotted. I would also expect to see court cases and fines (probably in excess of all profits for the product), for the labour conditions. So sure, you could probably sell it. You probably wouldn't profit from it though.
- a3n 10y ago
  But Apple, or any other similar multinational, claims no responsibility for any abuse of workers or economic laws, because it's not them it's Foxconn. The same as their explicit statements in the article, and the article's emphasis, that all these dealings are with partner companies. It allows Apple et. al to stay at least one remove from abuse, bribery, corruption, pollution, etc. It's the same when companies hire contracting agencies to run their warehouse operations. It's not Amazon's policies, it's the staffing/contracting/warehousing agency, who run operations according to Amazon's rules and just get it done, however they will. "Now be sure you don't abuse your workers while keeping to schedule and standards, wink wink." Or when ag companies buy tomatoes, for example, from Mexico, where the tomatoes are grown in healthier conditions than the workers live. Occasionally the abuse of these ag workers will surface, and companies like Walmart will point to yet other third party companies that they outsource compliance and certification to. "Our compliance partner has made a complaint to our ag partners, and it's all good."
- grecy 10y ago
  I'm in West Africa now and I'm experiencing this first-hand with regards to resource exploitation. Interestingly, the large oil players (Shell, BP, etc.) do actually mandate some things - i.e. they are not really supposed to buy oil from countries that don't have functioning elections, some environmental protections, human rights, etc. etc. I believe this is a requirement of the World Bank, and the UN. This is why you see shill elections in a lot of West African countries - they need it to look like they are functioning democracy, even though a country has had the same "elected" president for 22 years :) Also, this is why Africa loves dealing with China, who doesn't get involved in their internal politics.
- inimino 10y ago
  You would not be allowed to build such products because of US labor laws. Other sovereign countries have their own laws which they enforce within their borders and then we engage in trade. Why is it that the US should be enforcing its domestic regulations on other countries with entirely different circumstances which we know little about?
  - parhurs 10y ago
    The question wasn't about other countries, it was about the US, specifically regulating the sale of products 'not buildable' in the US. Stated another way, if something is only built to be sold, why is only building it regulated; why not regulate selling it aswell?
    - inimino 10y ago
      If it is built in the US, regulating the sale would be redundant, as manufacture would already be illegal, and more ethically made products don't look any different. If you want, say, textile workers to have humane working conditions, you regulate the textile manufacturing industry, and you want enforcement officers in the garment district, not the retail district.
      - parhurs 10y ago
        >If it is built in the US, regulating the sale would be redundant Obvious, but the question was about things NOT built in the US and actually illegal to build in the US. Why are they not illegal to sell there?
        inimino 10y ago
        First, as Americans seem so easily to forget, other countries actually have their own governments. Why should the US government try to enforce US labor laws inside the borders of other countries? Second, trade agreements exist and are a more effective way to do what you want. Third, it is impossible to tell how a product was made by looking at it. How would you enforce a law that makes a product illegal based on something invisible?
- mnopukyr 10y ago
  Let's say I were building product in the US with child labor in unsafe conditions not adhering to US laws and regulations. Would I be allowed to sell that product in the US? Probably not. I don't see why not. You read in the news a lot about how INS will raid a farm or meat processing factory to arrest illegal workers. Those conditions are often really unsafe and there are also teens working there too. And yet those farms are still able to sell their produce.
- amazingbmw 10y ago
  Where does the child labor come from? I didn't notice any mention of child labor in this article.
otabdeveloper 10y ago
Foxconn is far, far more than just iPhones or just Apple.
- andreasley 10y ago
  It is, but Apple seems to have become the largest customer and Foxconn's revenue seems to rise and fall with Apple's iPhone sales. This article [1] from 2013 states that "Hon Hai [...] draws an estimated 60 to 70 percent of its revenue from assembling gadgets and other work for Apple Inc.". [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-moving-from-foxconn-to-pegatron-2013-5?IR=T http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-moving-from-foxconn-to-...
- dopamean 10y ago
  Right but the article appears to mostly be about a single Foxconn facility that produces Apple products almost exclusively.
TheBeardKing 10y ago
>Apple manages to earn 90 percent of the profits in the smartphone industry worldwide, even though it accounts for only 12 percent of the sales That figure is astounding, that every other smartphone manufacturer shares only 10% of worldwide profit.
- skuhn 10y ago
  It's actually even worse than that (for everyone else). In Q3 2016 Apple had 104% of the profits -- because most of the other companies in that industry had no profits at all. Samsung came in at #2 with 0.9% of profits (they usually do a little better, but the Note 7 thing happened).
  - simonh 10y ago
    > had no profits at all. It's mainly because they actually suffered losses, which is why Apple's share can be more than 100%.
HillaryBriss 10y ago
>The well-choreographed customs routine is part of a hidden bounty of perks, tax breaks and subsidies in China that supports the world’s biggest iPhone factory, according to confidential government records reviewed by The New York Times, as well as more than 100 interviews with factory workers, logistics handlers, truck drivers, tax specialists and current and former Apple executives. The package of sweeteners and incentives, worth billions of dollars, is central to the production of the iPhone... So, Apple's high profits depend on a whole lot of government subsidies in China. And then Apple takes that cash and protects it from US tax rates by storing it in Ireland. And now, some interesting questions are raised about the legality of that tax scheme. Maybe the US doesn't need more businesses like Apple.
- wklauss 10y ago
  > So, Apple's high profits depend on a whole lot of government subsidies in China. And then Apple takes that cash and protects it from US tax rates by storing it in Ireland. And now, some interesting questions are raised about the legality of that tax scheme. They don't depend on them. Apple would still profit nicely (albeit less) without these subsidies. But then again the same thing could be say of various players on various industries. Detroit was, too, a city built thanks to a lot of subsidies and tax breaks; oil companies extract tremendous profits thanks to subsidies, tax breaks and all kinds of government help... so on and so forth. Aside from that, I don't think there's a question to be raised about the legality of Apple tax scheme. There's a question to be raised about it's fairness, sure, but not the legality. Apple is using the same loopholes any other corporation can exploit (and they all do, to the extent they can or know how to). What we need is updated international and national tax codes that start taking these things into account. Most of the current legislation was designed for a time much simpler and with less access to global markets and manufacturing chains.
  - HillaryBriss 10y ago
    > What we need is updated international and national tax codes that start taking these things into account. Most of the current legislation was designed for a time much simpler and with less access to global markets and manufacturing chains. it's a fair point. sometimes i think: who cares if Apple or Google or Exxon are headquartered in Cupertino or Mountain View or Dallas or New Delhi or Bahrain or Shenzhen? what difference does it make? who gives a shit? they don't want to pay taxes and neither do i.
bhewes 10y ago
The number that got me was it takes 350,000 people to make 350 IPhones a minute.
gumby 10y ago
> In China, the competition for companies is ... often focused on manufacturing partners, rather than multinationals themselves. This article doesn't include the word "unemployment" which is the reason for this focus. Though the official unemployment rate is 4%, the real rate is believed to be at least 12, not counting the non-existent migrants who aren't legally permitted to travel due to the hokou system. (I am always astonished when I hear that China is supposedly "beating" the US: by what possible metric could this be true?)

109 points by sr_banksy 10y ago

They've put pretty typical Apple-esque levels of effort into the entire chain, including financial shenanigans that got them in trouble with the EU. It'll be interesting to see whether they can make good on their promise to onshore some of their manufacturing.

siculars 10y ago

Beyond iPhone in China, I have a larger question. Let's say I were building product in the US with child labor in unsafe conditions not adhering to US laws and regulations. Would I be allowed to sell that product in the US? Probably not. If I were doing similarly around the world then seeking to sell that product in the US, it happens to be the case that I could. Why is that the case? Why is it that product built in foreign countries that do not adhere to US laws and regulations on manufacturing and labor are allowed to be sold in the US?

ue_ 10y ago
Because that's capitalism in today's world. It's the "free market" at work. I don't think the focus should be on preventing people from using "bad labour" but rather on making it so that there would be no reason to use "bad labour". As much as people on HN especially would be so critical of Socialism, they often shy away from these topics - beacuse they are uncomfortable to think about. The fact of the matter is that it's not good for business - neither for the people in government, nor for Apple, to be force Apple to make their products where there is some guarantee that the workers are being treated fairly. It's worse for Apple, of course, but politicians don't want to lose their lobbying money or their power. Lots of people will be saying "it's horrible what they're doing" without realising the cause - the unustainable model of global capitalism that is forever requiring higher and higher returns. Such growth for this kind of labour is much harder to accomplish where it costs more, such as in the US.
- tornadoboy55 10y ago
  > As much as people on HN especially would be so critical of Socialism Where do you get this from? Pretty much everyone from Europe is very grateful for the various safety nets the countries have built up there, especially in West-Europe.
  - TheBeardKing 10y ago
    It seems to have flipped as attitudes in Silicon Valley have flipped. Majority used to be Ron Paul supporters, now those attitudes seem to have matured to a more nuanced worldview.
- berntb 10y ago
  This article by Krugman changed my world view: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_dismal_science/1997/03/in_praise_of_cheap_labor.html http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_dismal_science/19... It is almost 20 years old and notes that industrialization and modernization is a process. It doesn't really work for a country to get rich without climbing it [edit: except free money, like with oil], including simple jobs in the beginning -- and now China is doing it. In my book, it is good for humanity with a billion less horribly poor people. It doesn't feel bad to be on the other side of that, because of ideology?
  - muninn_ 10y ago
    Thanks for posting this. It's incredibly Euro-centric to sit here and complain about the perceived child/human rights abuses that happen in China when those very exact things are what industrialized Europe. I really wish we would all just spend more time focusing on our countries and improving our quality of life through trade and the free exchange of ideas. Other countries don't have to listen to our lessons or advice, or our experience, but being critical gets us nowhere.
    - ue_ 10y ago
      >It's incredibly Euro-centric to sit here and complain about the perceived child/human rights abuses that happen in China when those very exact things are what industrialized Europe. It's also incredibly Euro-centric to be thinking that other countries ought to be following the path Europe and the US took to capitalism, and then to say that these countries should be implementing it in such a way that there's the same worker exploitation everywhere. Worker exploitation isn't some thing in the past. It doesn't just happen in China, it's happening all the time and everywhere. But the case of it is so readily apparent in China it ought to be a case against worker exploitation as a whole. Yet some people still say "nevermind these countries, they're just on their way to being like us". We do not stop to question whether being like Europe is actually beneficial?
intralizee 10y ago
I believe one of Apple's higher ups has talked about child labor before. I'm not sure if it was Steve or Tim but the convo was that its impossible to handle without hurting the communities because the norm is child labor over there. So the conditions for the children are worse if they have no labor. It's really complicated and not something that you can judge from an arm chair position, you have to go over there and see it with your own eyes.
- bisby 10y ago
  If you have a family of 6 (lets assume 2 parents and 4 kids) all working for 50 cents an hour. Saying "your kids have to go to school and not work" and then paying the adults 3 dollars an hour. The family winds up making more money without the kids having to work. (in this admittedly limited example, the family makes double) If you take the kids out of the equation without increasing the parental pay, then yes, you'll have a harder time with things, as the family just lost 66% of their income, which will mean cutting back. So you are correct that it is complicated and "stop kids from working" isn't the FULL answer. But it doesn't mean that there aren't solutions - plenty of countries have child labor laws without falling apart.
  - SanFranManDan 10y ago
    So now the cost of labor went up 6x? Don't you see a problem in that solution? The people only have jobs because labor is so cheap. Other countries don't have child labor laws because their job market evolved and pushed the low labor cost jobs into other countries.
    - bisby 10y ago
      I agree that labor cost is going to go up. And the whole point of this being enforced from the US side through tariffs and import regulations is so that when country A enacts child labor laws, Apple doesn't just move to country B. And I'm aware that it's a complicated, sensitive topic. That was my point. But dismissing it entirely because solution X creates problem Y instead of finding solution Y (which probably causes problem Z, which will have a solution eventually too) is not the right answer. Saying "Well we just can't solve this problem, they get to live in squalor and there's NOTHING that can be done to help them" is ridiculous.
xenadu02 10y ago
Maybe we shouldn't allow that. Perhaps we should apply a tax to adjust for environmental and labor impact. I imagine it would be $0 from Europe. A medium tax from China to account for the complete lack of environmental regulation. A high tax for products from places like Bangladesh. There is nothing that says we have to allow for free trade. It certainly hasn't been a net-benefit to the United States itself.
- vtange 10y ago
  But wouldn't that just burden American businesses against foreign competitors? It would make it so Americans would quit offshoring and simply incorporate outside of U.S. jurisdiction. That or lose to Chinese businesses that are less regulated and are thus free to be "more innovative"
  - sbov 10y ago
    How does incorporating somewhere else help? Tariffs are applied to imported goods, and presumably how said "high tax" would be applied. It doesn't matter where the company is incorporated.
  - gertef 10y ago
    It would level the playing field for all businesses. Incorporating outside the US wouldn't help the companies get access to US markets
wcummings 10y ago
Foxconn obviously isn't perfect but like 99.99% of their workforce is old enough to work legally.
jonknee 10y ago
> Why is it that product built in foreign countries that do not adhere to US laws and regulations on manufacturing and labor are allowed to be sold in the US? Because of our trade rules. Modern trade agreements are pretty much about mandating labor/environmental regulations and respect of IP (mainly pharma/movies/music) in exchange for easier access to the the US market.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
sfifs 10y ago
Question - when the US, Europe and Japan were industrializing from 1880s through 1960s and dragged everyone into disastrous wars, did any other market complain about worker safety or abuse or pollution (the famous London fog etc.) and refuse to buy products? When now other nations are going through an industrialization phase that's actually far more respectful of worker rights than the West's industrialization was, why complain?
- manarth 10y ago
  "did any other market complain about worker safety or abuse or pollution and refuse to buy products?" Pre-industrial revolution, living conditions were pretty poor working conditions were pretty poor life expectancy was pretty poor, so it wasn't exactly making things worse. Despite all the problems caused by industrialisation, it was still a net positive. Now that we've progressed through industrialisation to a point where life expectancy has dramatically improved, along with living conditions and all the rest, it's given us a point of comparison. Countries that are going through an industrialisation phase aren't being criticised in comparison to a pre-industrialisation state, they're being criticised in comparison to what other post-industrialised countries have achieved. Sure, it's an unfair comparison, but the first time around, that comparison didn't exist.
- gertef 10y ago
  Indonesian people weren't buying Europe's products and reaping the benefits of the London smog, modern US/European/Japanese people are enjoying the benefits of modern exploitative labor in Indonesia. What gives you the illusion that other nations are more respectful of worker rights than the US/EU was in the past? China's cities are poisoned with smog today, for just one example.
manarth 10y ago
"Would I be allowed to sell that product in the US? Probably not." I can't think of any legal reason why not. If the product meets US electrical/safety standards, and isn't in breach of IP such as patents, sure, it could be sold. Whether anyone would buy it is a different question: I wouldn't be surprised if a product built in such a way were boycotted. I would also expect to see court cases and fines (probably in excess of all profits for the product), for the labour conditions. So sure, you could probably sell it. You probably wouldn't profit from it though.
a3n 10y ago
But Apple, or any other similar multinational, claims no responsibility for any abuse of workers or economic laws, because it's not them it's Foxconn. The same as their explicit statements in the article, and the article's emphasis, that all these dealings are with partner companies. It allows Apple et. al to stay at least one remove from abuse, bribery, corruption, pollution, etc. It's the same when companies hire contracting agencies to run their warehouse operations. It's not Amazon's policies, it's the staffing/contracting/warehousing agency, who run operations according to Amazon's rules and just get it done, however they will. "Now be sure you don't abuse your workers while keeping to schedule and standards, wink wink." Or when ag companies buy tomatoes, for example, from Mexico, where the tomatoes are grown in healthier conditions than the workers live. Occasionally the abuse of these ag workers will surface, and companies like Walmart will point to yet other third party companies that they outsource compliance and certification to. "Our compliance partner has made a complaint to our ag partners, and it's all good."
grecy 10y ago
I'm in West Africa now and I'm experiencing this first-hand with regards to resource exploitation. Interestingly, the large oil players (Shell, BP, etc.) do actually mandate some things - i.e. they are not really supposed to buy oil from countries that don't have functioning elections, some environmental protections, human rights, etc. etc. I believe this is a requirement of the World Bank, and the UN. This is why you see shill elections in a lot of West African countries - they need it to look like they are functioning democracy, even though a country has had the same "elected" president for 22 years :) Also, this is why Africa loves dealing with China, who doesn't get involved in their internal politics.
inimino 10y ago
You would not be allowed to build such products because of US labor laws. Other sovereign countries have their own laws which they enforce within their borders and then we engage in trade. Why is it that the US should be enforcing its domestic regulations on other countries with entirely different circumstances which we know little about?
- parhurs 10y ago
  The question wasn't about other countries, it was about the US, specifically regulating the sale of products 'not buildable' in the US. Stated another way, if something is only built to be sold, why is only building it regulated; why not regulate selling it aswell?
  - inimino 10y ago
    If it is built in the US, regulating the sale would be redundant, as manufacture would already be illegal, and more ethically made products don't look any different. If you want, say, textile workers to have humane working conditions, you regulate the textile manufacturing industry, and you want enforcement officers in the garment district, not the retail district.
    - parhurs 10y ago
      >If it is built in the US, regulating the sale would be redundant Obvious, but the question was about things NOT built in the US and actually illegal to build in the US. Why are they not illegal to sell there?
      - inimino 10y ago
        First, as Americans seem so easily to forget, other countries actually have their own governments. Why should the US government try to enforce US labor laws inside the borders of other countries? Second, trade agreements exist and are a more effective way to do what you want. Third, it is impossible to tell how a product was made by looking at it. How would you enforce a law that makes a product illegal based on something invisible?
mnopukyr 10y ago
Let's say I were building product in the US with child labor in unsafe conditions not adhering to US laws and regulations. Would I be allowed to sell that product in the US? Probably not. I don't see why not. You read in the news a lot about how INS will raid a farm or meat processing factory to arrest illegal workers. Those conditions are often really unsafe and there are also teens working there too. And yet those farms are still able to sell their produce.
amazingbmw 10y ago
Where does the child labor come from? I didn't notice any mention of child labor in this article.

otabdeveloper 10y ago

Foxconn is far, far more than just iPhones or just Apple.

andreasley 10y ago
It is, but Apple seems to have become the largest customer and Foxconn's revenue seems to rise and fall with Apple's iPhone sales. This article [1] from 2013 states that "Hon Hai [...] draws an estimated 60 to 70 percent of its revenue from assembling gadgets and other work for Apple Inc.". [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-moving-from-foxconn-to-pegatron-2013-5?IR=T http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-moving-from-foxconn-to-...
dopamean 10y ago
Right but the article appears to mostly be about a single Foxconn facility that produces Apple products almost exclusively.

TheBeardKing 10y ago

>Apple manages to earn 90 percent of the profits in the smartphone industry worldwide, even though it accounts for only 12 percent of the sales That figure is astounding, that every other smartphone manufacturer shares only 10% of worldwide profit.

skuhn 10y ago
It's actually even worse than that (for everyone else). In Q3 2016 Apple had 104% of the profits -- because most of the other companies in that industry had no profits at all. Samsung came in at #2 with 0.9% of profits (they usually do a little better, but the Note 7 thing happened).
- simonh 10y ago
  > had no profits at all. It's mainly because they actually suffered losses, which is why Apple's share can be more than 100%.

HillaryBriss 10y ago

>The well-choreographed customs routine is part of a hidden bounty of perks, tax breaks and subsidies in China that supports the world’s biggest iPhone factory, according to confidential government records reviewed by The New York Times, as well as more than 100 interviews with factory workers, logistics handlers, truck drivers, tax specialists and current and former Apple executives. The package of sweeteners and incentives, worth billions of dollars, is central to the production of the iPhone... So, Apple's high profits depend on a whole lot of government subsidies in China. And then Apple takes that cash and protects it from US tax rates by storing it in Ireland. And now, some interesting questions are raised about the legality of that tax scheme. Maybe the US doesn't need more businesses like Apple.

wklauss 10y ago
> So, Apple's high profits depend on a whole lot of government subsidies in China. And then Apple takes that cash and protects it from US tax rates by storing it in Ireland. And now, some interesting questions are raised about the legality of that tax scheme. They don't depend on them. Apple would still profit nicely (albeit less) without these subsidies. But then again the same thing could be say of various players on various industries. Detroit was, too, a city built thanks to a lot of subsidies and tax breaks; oil companies extract tremendous profits thanks to subsidies, tax breaks and all kinds of government help... so on and so forth. Aside from that, I don't think there's a question to be raised about the legality of Apple tax scheme. There's a question to be raised about it's fairness, sure, but not the legality. Apple is using the same loopholes any other corporation can exploit (and they all do, to the extent they can or know how to). What we need is updated international and national tax codes that start taking these things into account. Most of the current legislation was designed for a time much simpler and with less access to global markets and manufacturing chains.
- HillaryBriss 10y ago
  > What we need is updated international and national tax codes that start taking these things into account. Most of the current legislation was designed for a time much simpler and with less access to global markets and manufacturing chains. it's a fair point. sometimes i think: who cares if Apple or Google or Exxon are headquartered in Cupertino or Mountain View or Dallas or New Delhi or Bahrain or Shenzhen? what difference does it make? who gives a shit? they don't want to pay taxes and neither do i.

bhewes 10y ago

The number that got me was it takes 350,000 people to make 350 IPhones a minute.

gumby 10y ago

> In China, the competition for companies is ... often focused on manufacturing partners, rather than multinationals themselves. This article doesn't include the word "unemployment" which is the reason for this focus. Though the official unemployment rate is 4%, the real rate is believed to be at least 12, not counting the non-existent migrants who aren't legally permitted to travel due to the hokou system. (I am always astonished when I hear that China is supposedly "beating" the US: by what possible metric could this be true?)