Apple, America and a squeezed Middle Class

[InRareForm]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1

[boutons_deux]

National Science Board Report: US Losing Research and Development Jobs To Asia



The United States is losing ever more jobs and becoming ever less competitive as our universities are cut back and companies move R&D jobs to Asia. We lost 687,000 high-tech manufacturing jobs lost since 2000. Universities cut back 20% on public research. 85% of growth in R&D employment by American companies occurred abroad.

Jobs Lost

Product Design and Development News: U.S. High-tech Jobs Lost as Technological Lead Shrinks

The United States lost 28 percent of its high-technology manufacturing jobs over the last decade, as the nation’s rapidly shrinking lead in science and technology in the global marketplace was accompanied by a toll on U.S. high-tech jobs, according to a new study released today by the National Science Board (NSB), the policy making body for the National Science Foundation.

One of the most dramatic signs of this trend was the loss of 687,000 high-technology manufacturing jobs since 2000. U.S. multinational corporations also created research and development (R&D) jobs overseas at an unprecedented rate. Meanwhile, China became the world leader in high-technology trade and, for the first time, Asia matched the United States in R&D investments.

Companies Moving R&D

WSJ: US Loses Out as R&D Shifts to Asia,

The U.S. is rapidly losing high-technology jobs as American companies expand their research-and-development labs in China and elsewhere in Asia, the National Science Board said Tuesday.

[. . .] Since 2004, about 85% of the growth in R&D workers employed by U.S.-based multinational companies has been abroad, according to the National Science Board, a policy-making arm of the National Science Foundation, a U.S. agency. U.S. companies generally aren't closing labs at home but rather focusing their expansion abroad. The overseas portion of their R&D employment grew to about 27% in 2009 from 16% in 2004, the report said.

Universities Cutting Back, Too

At the same time, budget cuts are forcing our Universities to cut back on R&D.

The Chronicle of Higher Education: State Budget Cuts for Research Universities Imperil Competitiveness, Report Says

States have cut funds for public research universities by 20 percent in constant dollars from 2002 to 2010, according to a report issued on Tuesday by the National Science Foundation.

The report, "Science and Engineering Indicators: 2012," is a compendium almost 600 pages long of scientific trends in the United States and around the world. The agency releases such data every two years.

The findings in this year's report demonstrate a continuing trend in scientific innovation. While countries like China and India have increased their spending on technology and education, the United States has found itself hamstrung by a weakened economy since 2008.

Other Findings

From the Product Design and Development News story,

Other key findings in the report include:

Three countries—the United States, China and Japan—were responsible for more than half of the world’s $1.28 trillion in R&D spending in 2009. (China overtook Japan during the last decade to become the second-largest R&D-performing nation.)
Between 1999 and 2009, the United States’ share of R&D dropped from 38 percent to 31 percent; the EU’s share declined from 27 percent to 23 percent; and the Asian region grew from 24 percent to 32 percent.
Many Asian countries have increased their investment in R&D relative to their GDP, with China almost tripling its R&D/GDP ratio since 1996. The United States’ R&D/GDP ratio recently has edged upward, while that of the EU has remained steady.
The developed world’s lead in higher education has declined dramatically. In 2008, only 4 percent of the world’s engineering degrees were earned in the United States, while 56 percent were awarded in Asia, including one-third in China.
The number of natural sciences and engineering doctorates awarded by Chinese universities has more than tripled since 2000. At 26,000 awarded in 2008, the number of these Chinese doctorates now exceeds the number earned in the United States. And, unlike in China, a large share of these U.S. doctoral degrees are awarded to foreign students. In 2009, 44 percent of the 24,700 U.S. natural sciences and engineering doctorates were awarded to temporary visa holders. Some 57 percent of engineering doctorates were awarded to foreign students.
American industry, which historically has supported about 60 percent of U.S. R&D, reduced R&D funding by nearly 4 percent in 2009. (A rise in U.S. government R&D funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act partially offset the private-sector reduction.)
Job losses from the 2007–2009 recession were less severe for science and engineering workers than for the U.S. workforce as a whole. In 2010, the median income for workers in science and engineering jobs ($73,290) was more than double the median income of all U.S. workers ($33,840).

What To Do?

The Obama Administration has been working to address some of these trends, for example by setting up a cabinet-level Office of Manufacturing Policy. To improve our position they could take more action against trade law violations and currency manipulation, address tax policies that encourage companies to move manufacturing jobs out of the country and renegotiate badly-designed trade treaties.

The Alliance for American Manufacturing offers a number of concrete steps for reversing these trends, including,

Establish a manufacturing investment facility to leverage private capital for domestic manufacturing
Expand and make permanent clean energy manufacturing tax credits and industrial energy ef?ciency grants to allow America to lead on green job creation
Refocus on technical and vocational education, providing a seamless program that bridges high school and post-secondary education to produce the next generation of highly skilled manufacturing workers
Penalize and deter mercantilist nations such as China that manipulate their exchange rates and implement non-tariff barriers to gain an unfair trade advantage
Make permanent the research and development tax credit and enhance it to incentivize commercialization and production in America
Focus federal investments in new technology and workforce training on promoting regional clusters of innovation, learning and production

Meanwhile, conservatives oppose a national industrial policy, oppose restructuring our trade deals, oppose increased funding for our universities, oppose changes to tax policies to incentivize returning manufacturing to the US, oppose paying good wages here to bring researchers here, oppose national policies helping companies become more competitive internationally and oppose border tariffs to compensate for advantages gained from environmental degradation and poor human rights practices.

Other countries take this seriously. From the Chronicle of Higher Education story,

While spending on research and development has increased globally over the past decade, such expenditures in the United States fell from 38 percent of the worldwide total to 31 percent. In comparison, China's R&D spending increased from 22 percent as recently as 2007 to 28 percent in 2009.

From the Product Design and Development News story,

Dr. José-Marie Griffiths, chairman of the NSB committee that oversees production of the report, “Other nations clearly recognize the economic and social benefits of investing in R&D and education, and they are challenging the United States’ leadership position. We’re seeing the result in the very real, and substantial, loss of good jobs.”

www.truthout.org

[boutons_deux]

The State of Our Disunion: A Globalizing Private Sector, A Government Overwhelmed by Corporate Money



Who should have the primary strategic responsibility for making American workers globally competitive – the private sector or government? This will be a defining issue in the 2012 campaign.

In his State of the Union address, President Obama will make the case that government has a vital role. His Republican rivals disagree. Mitt Romney charges the President is putting “free enterprise on trial,” while Newt Gingrich merely fulminates about “liberal elites.”

American business won’t and can’t lead the way to more and better jobs in the United States. First, the private sector is increasingly global, with less and less stake in America. Second, it’s driven by the necessity of creating profits, not better jobs.

The National Science Foundation has just released its biennial report on global investment in science, engineering and technology. The NSF warns that the United States is quickly losing ground to Asia, especially to China. America’s share of global R&D spending is tumbling. In the decade to 2009, it dropped from 38 percent to 31 percent, while Asia’s share rose from 24 to 35 percent.

One big reason: According to the NSF, American firms nearly doubled their R&D investment in Asia over these years, to over $7.5 billion.

GE recently announced a $500 million expansion of its R&D facilities in China. The firm has already invested $2 billion.

GE’s CEO Jeffrey Immelt chairs Obama’s council on work and competitiveness. I’d wager that as an American citizen, Immelt is concerned about working Americans. But as CEO of GE, Immelt’s job is to be concerned about GE’s shareholders. They aren’t the same.

GE has also been creating more jobs outside the United States than in it. A decade ago, fewer than half of GE’s employees were non-American; today, 54 percent are.

This is all good for GE and its shareholders, but it’s not necessarily good for America or American workers. The Commerce Department says U.S. based global corporations added 2.4 million workers abroad in first decade of 21st century, while cutting their US workforce by 2.9 million.

According to the New York Times, Apple Computer employs 43,000 people in the United States but contracts with over 700,000 workers abroad. It makes iPhones in China not only because of low wages there but also the ease and speed with which its Chinese contractor can mobilize their workers – from company dormitories at almost any hour of the day or night.

An Apple executive says “We don’t have an obligation to solve America’s problems. Our only obligation is making the best product possible.” He might have added “and showing a big enough profits to continually increase our share price.”

Most executives of American companies agree. If they can make it best and cheapest in China, or anywhere else, that’s where it will be made. Don’t blame them. That’s what they’re getting paid to do.

What they want in America is lower corporate taxes, less regulation, and fewer unionized workers. But none of these will bring good jobs to America. These steps may lower the costs of production here, but global companies can always find even lower costs abroad.

Global corporations — wherever they’re based — will create good jobs for Americans only if Americans are productive enough to summon them. Problem is, a large and growing portion of our workforce isn’t equipped to be productive.

Put simply, American workers are hobbled by deteriorating schools, unaffordable college tuitions, decaying infrastructure, and declining basic R&D. All of this is putting us on a glide path toward even lousier jobs and lower wages.

Get it? The strategic responsibility for making Americans more globally competitive can’t be centered in the private sector because the private sector is rapidly going global, and it’s designed to make profits rather than good jobs. The core responsibility has to be in government because government is supposed to be looking out for the public, and investing in public schools, colleges, infrastructure, and basic R&D.

But here’s the political problem. American firms have huge clout in Washington. They maintain legions of lobbyists and are pouring boatloads of money into political campaigns. After the Supreme Court’s Citizen’s United decision, there’s no limit.

Who represents the American workforce? Organized labor represents fewer than 7 percent of private-sector workers and has all it can do to protect a dwindling number of unionized jobs.

Republicans like it this way, and for three decades have been trying to convince average working Americans government is their enemy. Yet corporate America isn’t their friend. Without bold government action on behalf of our workforce, good American jobs will continue to disappear.

www.truthout.org

=============

I'm sure Fox Repug Network is giving the topics in this thread repeated-ad-nauseam priority.

[boutons_deux]

Emblematic of 1 Percenters, Cooper Tire Punk’d Workers

Four years ago, Cooper Tire told its workers they’d have to sacrifice to save the company. With a straight face, Cooper executives said it was essential for the corporation’s survival that workers take tens of millions in pay and benefit cuts.

The workers understood the link between their livelihoods long term and Cooper’s success. Dedicated and loyal, they accepted the cutbacks. Soon afterward, city and state officials granted Cooper millions in subsidies.

Management didn’t share in the workers’ and taxpayers’ pain, though. The top dogs rewarded themselves with millions in pay increases and a shiny new corporate jet.

Cooper punk’d the workers and taxpayers.

This isn’t an aberration. It’s a pattern. Corporate executives, the 1 percenters, slash workers’ wages, then give themselves big bonuses. CEOs tell mayors and governors their businesses are in such dire shape that they may close or move offshore. Government officials dutifully shovel truckloads of taxpayer cash into CEO hands, then the CEOs grant themselves more perks. The television show Punk’d, in which actor Aston Kutcher humiliates famous people, took a five-year hiatus. The 1 percenters gave workers and taxpayers no such break. Punking the 99 percent for profit has only escalated.

http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2012/01/24/emblematic-of-1-percenters-cooper-tire-punk%E2%80%99d-workers/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=alternet#

Class Warfare: The Employer Class waging scorched-earth war on the Employee Class, and fucking local taxpayers.

[vy65]

Yo, B, did you bother reading the article?

[boutons_deux]

I read about half of it, got the big picture, just part of the overall context of globalzied UCA and its investors seeking exclusively its own benefit while goosing the 99% with the "magic hand".

Absolute proof of WHY UCA pushed so hard for "globalization" these past 30 years, while Human-Americans paid little attention until it was too damn late. There's no stopping globalization, anyway, nor stopping/penalizing China for holding its currency 30% below natural exchange rate.

[vy65]

I read about half of it, got the big picture, just part of the overall context of globalzied UCA and its investors seeking exclusively its own benefit while goosing the 99% with the "magic hand".

Where's that part of the article?


Absolute proof of WHY UCA pushed so hard for "globalization" these past 30 years, while Human-Americans paid little attention until it was too damn late. There's no stopping globalization, anyway, nor stopping/penalizing China for holding its currency 30% below natural exchange rate.

Why's that relevant to the article?

[boutons_deux]

Apple benefit from no tariffs on goods researched/built/imported from China, the key result of "free market" globalization.

Trying to read this stuff in isolation, ie, without context, keeps you stupid and confused.

[vy65]

Apple benefit from no tariffs on goods researched/built/imported from China, the key result of "free market" globalization.

Trying to read this stuff in isolation, ie, without context, keeps you stupid and confused.

For someone who (admittedly, lol) read only half of the article, I think you need to seriously reassess who's looking stupid and confused right now.

[boutons_deux]

Apple mentioned:

http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/766466/how_fraudsters%2C_cheaters_and_exploiters_killed_t he_economy/#paragraph4

[DarrinS]

Hmmm. Asians work harder and for less money. No brainer for Apple. We could move all those jobs here if Americans are willing to pay 3K for their iPads.

[101A]

The OP takes a critical tone toward the US - blaming us for not churning out the right number of appropriately skilled employees; but uses as its main production differentiation a world in which thousands of employees live in dorms, and can be called in at a (literally) moments notice to work long shifts to get otherwise impossible tasks done. The only real parallel I could draw to that in this country would be the military (which I guess, being communist, all citizens of china have that type of relationship with their government).

For an article about where the middle class has gone - it hasn't gone to China; those jobs are decidedly not U.S. standard Middle Class. It's better than what they've had over there, but by our standards; it's forced labor exploitation.

The scary part of this is that I always assumed that breaking the back of the American consumer would have a self-leveling effect: as the middle class shrank, and couldn't buy as much, jobs would return here (Henry Ford's epiphany revisited). However, it appears, based on quotes from Apple corporate, that there are plenty of consumers in other places taking our place. It might be too late for tariffs, frankly. Apple would just let the U.S. consumer (who could afford it), pay those, while making the bulk of their profit other places. Further class stratification might be, as B points out, inevitable; at least until workers around the World ALL demand a decent wage/living condition - relatively not that far in the future in China, but centuries before the World runs out of exploitable man power.

[ChumpDumper]

Hmmm. Asians work harder and for less money. No brainer for Apple. We could move all those jobs here if Americans are willing to pay 3K for their iPads.Where did you get the 3K number?

[101A]

I'm also thinking the factory next to factory dynamic at play in China, and described in the OP, is now environmentally (from a regulatory standpoint) impossible in this country.

[DarrinS]

Where did you get the 3K number?


Your ass

[ChumpDumper]

Your assSo you just made it up?

[DarrinS]

So you just made it up?

Well, it would obviously cost a lot more if made in America. That was the point.

[CosmicCowboy]

So you just made it up?

Realistically, he is probably low. The I-Pad is supposedly a labor intensive item. Compare the $17 a day/12 hour day wage mentioned in the OP article with $35 an hour X 1.5 after 8 hours basic union wage in the US.

[ChumpDumper]

Well, it would obviously cost a lot more if made in America. That was the point.You just made up that number.

That's the point.


Realistically, he is probably low. The I-Pad is supposedly a labor intensive item. Compare the $17 a day/12 hour day wage mentioned in the OP article with $35 an hour X 1.5 after 8 hours basic union wage in the US.The labor cost is addressed in the article and it is far lower than you might think. I realize there are other costs.

[DarrinS]

You just made up that number.

That's the point.




If you know exactly how much it would be if it were made in the US, feel free to post that number and show all of your work.

[Wild Cobra]

Don't blame Apple. Blame our tax system, regulations, politicians, etc.

Where are tariffs when you need them?

[Winehole23]

lol indignant non-readers

[ChumpDumper]

If you know exactly how much it would be if it were made in the US, feel free to post that number and show all of your work.You're the one who made up a specific number, posted it and didn't show any work.

[CosmicCowboy]

lol indignant non-readers

I'm certainly not indignant. I think Foxconn is an amazing business model...damn...can you IMAGINE 230,000 people working in one facility? Thats almost 1/3 the population of Austin...

[Winehole23]

I wasn't addressing you, Sir

[Winehole23]

but do go on...

[DarrinS]

You're the one who made up a specific number, posted it and didn't show any work.

It's called an educated guess.

[Winehole23]

great excuse for a wild exaggeration

[CosmicCowboy]

:frying::deadhorse

[ChumpDumper]

It's called an educated guess.Educated by what?

Show your work for the specific number you posted.

[DarrinS]

great excuse for a wild exaggeration

I listed a price 5x the current retail.

Foxconn workers make about $187 per month. How much would a minumum wage American make in a month? Min wage is over $7/hr.

The labor is about 6x higher.


exaggeration?

[DarrinS]

Snide, snarky, nitpickety mofos in here.

[ChumpDumper]

I listed a price 5x the current retail.

Foxconn workers make about $187 per month. How much would a minumum wage American make in a month? Min wage is over $7/hr.

The labor is about 6x higher.


exaggeration?Yes. A laughably uneducated exaggeration.

[ChumpDumper]

Snide, snarky, nitpickety mofos in here.Thin-skinned, hypocritical ignoramuses in here.

[ElNono]

It's easy to say people should work 12-hour shifts for $17/day when you completely overlook what it costs to live here and there. Union or no union, you simply cannot make ends meet with that pay scale.

Blaming "our tax system, regulations, politicians, etc." isn't closing that gap...

Tariffs are an artificial stopgap solution that doesn't really address the problem, and will likely feed a black market that in all cases causes more harm in the long run.

Short of devaluing the dollar and going through an inflationary spiral, I don't outright know if there's a solution to this.

[Wild Cobra]

I listed a price 5x the current retail.

Foxconn workers make about $187 per month. How much would a minumum wage American make in a month? Min wage is over $7/hr.

The labor is about 6x higher.


exaggeration?
Still, cost of labor it typically under 20% for a retail product. Quite often much less.

[Wild Cobra]

It's easy to say people should work 12-hour shifts for $17/day when you completely overlook what it costs to live here and there. Union or no union, you simply cannot make ends meet with that pay scale.

Blaming "our tax system, regulations, politicians, etc." isn't closing that gap...

Tariffs are an artificial stopgap solution that doesn't really address the problem, and will likely feed a black market that in all cases causes more harm in the long run.

Short of devaluing the dollar and going through an inflationary spiral, I don't outright know if there's a solution to this.
I like (not) how you complain about solutions, and never have one yourself. Funny how when I mention devaluing the dollar and accepting that inflation, you, with all the other normal WC naysayers were against it.

[ElNono]

I like (not) how you complain about solutions, and never have one yourself. Funny how when I mention devaluing the dollar and accepting that inflation, you, with all the other normal WC naysayers were against it.

You didn't offer a solution, and neither did I. Devaluing the dollar and the ensuing inflationary spiral would have catastrophic effects on the economy (the first thing that goes with high inflation is credit).

It's not a solution, but it might just happen if the national credit card dries up.

Tariffs are probably the most realistic measure, but they have to be temporary.

[Wild Cobra]

I have offered so0lutions in the past. We need to reduce or stop taxing productivity. We need to review regulations that have negative effects and see if they are really necessary ones. I have advocated changing from an income tax system to a consumption tax system, which will level the taxation imbalance between us and other countries.

Tariffs should not arbitrarily be short term. They are necessary to be high on items we want to reduce competition with US items, and low or zero on US items we don't or can't produce here. They need to be flexible to maintain variety, but keep US products cheaper than comparable imports.

The root problem of our economic problems is not having enough jobs. We need to bring them back.

[ElNono]

I have offered so0lutions in the past. We need to reduce or stop taxing productivity. We need to review regulations that have negative effects and see if they are really necessary ones. I have advocated changing from an income tax system to a consumption tax system, which will level the taxation imbalance between us and other countries.

That doesn't address the fact that people can/are willing to live earning $17/day in China, and that's just not possible in this country. You could remove every single tax and regulation and you still can't close that gap.


Tariffs should not arbitrarily be short term. They are necessary to be high on items we want to reduce competition with US items, and low or zero on US items we don't or can't produce here. They need to be flexible to maintain variety, but keep US products cheaper than comparable imports.

There's actual economic reasons as to why tariffs should either be temporary or marginally low (which in the case of China would be very difficult, since I order to counter their devalued currency you would need at least a 36% markup).

Among the chief issues is that tariffs artificially inflate the value of goods, and if they remain for long, in almost all cases create an incentive for an (illegal) black market of imports. That in turn bring other consequences, like sales tax evasion for example (the import is already illegal, might as well pocket the sales tax money). Lots of countries have gone through either draconian or long term tariffs, and in every case they lose their effectiveness over time.


The root problem of our economic problems is not having enough jobs. We need to bring them back.

Those jobs aren't coming back until this country is competitive again. Right now that mark is "willing to work 12 hour shifts for $17/day"

[Wild Cobra]

That doesn't address the fact that people can/are willing to live earning $17/day in China, and that's just not possible in this country. You could remove every single tax and regulation and you still can't close that gap.

My fucking god. You are such a liberal tool.

How many times have I said there is no single solution. It is one piece of the puzzle that helps balance the scale.


There's actual economic reasons as to why tariffs should either be temporary or marginally low (which in the case of China would be very difficult, since I order to counter their devalued currency you would need at least a 36% markup).

I don't have a problem with that. Do you?


Among the chief issues is that tariffs artificially inflate the value of goods, and if they remain for long, in almost all cases create an incentive for an (illegal) black market of imports. That in turn bring other consequences, like sales tax evasion for example (the import is already illegal, might as well pocket the sales tax money). Lots of countries have gone through either draconian or long term tariffs, and in every case they lose their effectiveness over time.

A very small inconvenience. Any that became large enough to be a problem, would be easily found and dealt with by the justice system.


Those jobs aren't coming back until this country is competitive again. Right now that mark is "willing to work 12 hour shifts for $17/day"

No fucking shit.

It isn't all about wages. Why are you so narrow minded?

[ElNono]

My fucking god. You are such a liberal tool

How many times have I said there is no single solution. It is one piece of the puzzle that helps balance the scale.

:lol What scale are you trying to balance?

The puzzle is $17/day... We can't compete with that. Not with this cost of living.

lol fucking idiot calling anybody else a tool
lol doesn't understand the problem, but proposes inane 'solutions'


I don't have a problem with that. Do you?

Of course I would have a problem with that. Basically Chinese goods (which is fucking everything these days) will cost 36% more, while my salary stays the same.
My purchase power just took a hit overnight, and my salary basically diluted. Even if Made in USA products would show up a bit cheaper, it would still be far from the current values.

Basically, you just lowered my standard of living in a completely artificial fashion (Chinese keep producing and selling to other countries without tariffs at the real price).


A very small inconvenience. Any that became large enough to be a problem, would be easily found and dealt with by the justice system.

Like the prohibition or drug trafficking? At 36% rates + sales taxes (easily another 7 or so percent) over billions (trillions?) of dollars of goods, it's a lot of dough. I'll have to look up some figures, but I'm fairly certain that in almost all cases long-term draconian tariffs lose effectiveness due to black markets.


No fucking shit.
It isn't all about wages. Why are you so narrow minded?

:lol Bitching to politicians and reducing corporate taxes isn't getting you 12 hour day shifts and $17/day. You can spin that shit all you want, your argument is just full of hot air.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

I'm trying to figure out what you said that was so liberal. All I read was the standard free trade argument. WC just being stupid as per normal.

[Wild Cobra]

:lol What scale are you trying to balance?

The puzzle is $17/day... We can't compete with that. Not with this cost of living.

lol fucking idiot calling anybody else a tool
lol doesn't understand the problem, but proposes inane 'solutions'



Of course I would have a problem with that. Basically Chinese goods (which is fucking everything these days) will cost 36% more, while my salary stays the same.
My purchase power just took a hit overnight, and my salary basically diluted. Even if Made in USA products would show up a bit cheaper, it would still be far from the current values.

Basically, you just lowered my standard of living in a completely artificial fashion (Chinese keep producing and selling to other countries without tariffs at the real price).



Like the prohibition or drug trafficking? At 36% rates + sales taxes (easily another 7 or so percent) over billions (trillions?) of dollars of goods, it's a lot of dough. I'll have to look up some figures, but I'm fairly certain that in almost all cases long-term draconian tariffs lose effectiveness due to black markets.



:lol Bitching to politicians and reducing corporate taxes isn't getting you 12 hour day shifts and $17/day. You can spin that shit all you want, your argument is just full of hot air.
You're the idiot. You refuse to see how more than one change fits together. Tariffs make the balance in the end.

[boutons_deux]

Apple: made in China, untaxed profits kept offshore

Summary: About two-thirds of Apple’s $97.6 billion cash pile is offshore. That’s a lot of money for an American company to keep outside of America.

Governor Mitch Daniels also played the Steve Jobs card, saying “The late Steve Jobs — what a fitting name he had — created more of them than all those stimulus dollars the President borrowed and blew.”

Partisanship aside, certainly Apple has created a lot of jobs over the years. But today, most of the jobs created by Apple are not American jobs, they’re sweatshop-style jobs for miserable, overworked workers in China.

According to the New York Times, Apple employs 43,000 people in the United States. That’s not an inconsiderable number of people. However, Apple no longer builds its own devices. There was a time when Apple computers were actually manufactured in the United States. Today, Apple products are built in China. Foxconn City has 230,000 people working to make iPhones and iPads — and Presidential candidate Rick Santorum claims more than 500,000 people build Apple products in China.

In other words, Apple provides jobs to more than 10 times more employees outside the United States than in the United States.

“$64 billion of that is offshore, Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer stated during the call — meaning, it would cost money (taxes) to bring it back into the U.S.”

Despite TechCrunch’s reputation for inflammatory posts, Siegler’s allegation is troubling. I’m not an international finance expert, but the idea — the mere idea — that a company like Apple would store its big wad of loot offshore to avoid paying its fair share to America makes me ill.

I floated this troubling thought to ZDNet’s editors before running this story and to ask for some of their advice about how to approach telling you about it. Ed Bott reminded me that there was a great deal of discussion of the same issue when Microsoft was purchasing Skype. Microsoft has $42 billion overseas.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/government/apple-made-in-china-untaxed-profits-kept-offshore/11126?tag=nl.e539

=================

Will the UCA get another "tax expenditure" like the Repugs gave them a few year ago?

dubya let the corps, primarily BigPharma, repatriate $300B in profits at only 5%, not 35%.

In return, the corps were to "create jobs".

A year or two later, BigPharma laid off about 50K people.

[boutons_deux]

Apple: made in China, untaxed profits kept offshore

Summary: About two-thirds of Apple’s $97.6 billion cash pile is offshore. That’s a lot of money for an American company to keep outside of America.

Governor Mitch Daniels also played the Steve Jobs card, saying “The late Steve Jobs — what a fitting name he had — created more of them than all those stimulus dollars the President borrowed and blew.”

Partisanship aside, certainly Apple has created a lot of jobs over the years. But today, most of the jobs created by Apple are not American jobs, they’re sweatshop-style jobs for miserable, overworked workers in China.

According to the New York Times, Apple employs 43,000 people in the United States. That’s not an inconsiderable number of people. However, Apple no longer builds its own devices. There was a time when Apple computers were actually manufactured in the United States. Today, Apple products are built in China. Foxconn City has 230,000 people working to make iPhones and iPads — and Presidential candidate Rick Santorum claims more than 500,000 people build Apple products in China.

In other words, Apple provides jobs to more than 10 times more employees outside the United States than in the United States.

“$64 billion of that is offshore, Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer stated during the call — meaning, it would cost money (taxes) to bring it back into the U.S.”

Despite TechCrunch’s reputation for inflammatory posts, Siegler’s allegation is troubling. I’m not an international finance expert, but the idea — the mere idea — that a company like Apple would store its big wad of loot offshore to avoid paying its fair share to America makes me ill.

I floated this troubling thought to ZDNet’s editors before running this story and to ask for some of their advice about how to approach telling you about it. Ed Bott reminded me that there was a great deal of discussion of the same issue when Microsoft was purchasing Skype. Microsoft has $42 billion overseas.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/government/apple-made-in-china-untaxed-profits-kept-offshore/11126?tag=nl.e539

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Will the UCA get another "tax expenditure" like the Repugs gave them a few year ago?

dubya let the corps, primarily BigPharma, repatriate $300B in profits at only 5%, not 35%.

In return, the corps were to "create jobs".

A year or two later, BigPharma laid off about 50K people.

[boutons_deux]

Will Noot tell these (probably not very black) people to get a paycheck instead of food stamps?

"All told, Wall Street laid off more than 200,000 employees in 2011 alone."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/26/james-gorman-morgan-stanley-ceo_n_1232345.html?ref=daily-brief?utm_source=DailyBrief&utm_campaign=012612&utm_medium=email&utm_content=NewsEntry&utm_term=Daily%20Brief

[boutons_deux]

In China, Human Costs Are Built Into an iPad

In the last decade, Apple has become one of the mightiest, richest and most successful companies in the world, in part by mastering global manufacturing.

Apple and its high-technology peers - as well as dozens of other American industries - have achieved a pace of innovation nearly unmatched in modern history. However, the workers assembling iPhones, iPads and other devices often labor in harsh conditions, according to employees inside those plants, worker advocates and documents published by companies themselves.

Problems are as varied as onerous work environments and serious - sometimes deadly - safety problems.Employees work excessive overtime, in some cases seven days a week, and live in crowded dorms. Some say they stand so long that their legs swell until they can hardly walk. Under-age workers have helped build Apple's products, and the company's suppliers have improperly disposed of hazardous waste and falsified records, according to company reports and advocacy groups that, within China, are often considered reliable, independent monitors.

More troubling, the groups say, is some suppliers' disregard for workers' health. Two years ago, 137 workers at an Apple supplier in eastern China were injured after they were ordered to use a poisonous chemical to clean iPhone screens. Within seven months last year, two explosions at iPad factories, including in Chengdu, killed four people and injured 77.

Before those blasts, Apple had been alerted to hazardous conditions inside the Chengdu plant, according to a Chinese group that published that warning.

"If Apple was warned, and didn't act, that's reprehensible," said Nicholas Ashford, a former chairman of the National Advisory Committee on Occupational Safety and Health, a group that advises the United States Labor Department. "But what's morally repugnant in one country is accepted business practices in another, and companies take advantage of that." Apple is not the only electronics company doing business within a troubling supply system. Bleak working conditions have been documented at factories manufacturing products for Dell, Hewlett-Packard, I.B.M., Lenovo, Motorola, Nokia, Sony, Toshiba and others.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/26/business/ieconomy-apples-ipad-and-the-human-costs-for-workers-in-china.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=apple%20china&st=cse


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One reason why Noot and Repugs want child labor laws repealed, so children can be abused and underpaid in workplaces.

[ElNono]

You're the idiot. You refuse to see how more than one change fits together. Tariffs make the balance in the end.

I don't refuse to see anything. As I've pointed out, your suggestions amount to basically tweaks that would make sense if the gap in cost of living wouldn't be so far apart. But they are so far apart, that they amount to pandering, as they would provide zero solutions at this stage.

:lol when you start hurling insults and calling upon god instead of addressing points, I know you've pulled the white flag.

[Wild Cobra]

I don't refuse to see anything. As I've pointed out, your suggestions amount to basically tweaks that would make sense if the gap in cost of living wouldn't be so far apart. But they are so far apart, that they amount to pandering, as they would provide zero solutions at this stage.

:lol when you start hurling insults and calling upon god instead of addressing points, I know you've pulled the white flag.
So you want to continue sending labor off shore so that you can have cheaper goods?

Don't you get it... You are part of the problem!