Some years ago, I read an article or heard an interview with a cognition / psychology / "cultural" expert (my apology, I know longer recall their exact credentials).
That person described how the human mind can be views as a "giant", very powerful comparison engine. We are constantly evaluating our environment, including and especially our social environment, and our standing within it.
If you are "doing as well as other people" -- sort of at the mean -- you are more relaxed. You feel secure, a part of the group with an established and respected place. You have social support (and its economic, defensive, etc. supports).
If you are not doing that well, you become stressed. You are in a vulnerable position.
I don't know whether I should be speaking of "mean" or "average". Nor to what extent media influence our perception of what that is.
But I've never lost hold of that description, from years ago, and it continues to prod my thinking. And I think a lot of people in the U.S. feel more threatened than ever.
Vast GDP is not reassuring, when you're not a part of it. Instead, it becomes threatening. Because you have no influence nor power compared to those people.
And the past some decades have demonstrated, that those people will continue to enrich themselves at your expense.
It may have been illusion more than reality, more often than people want to imagine: But the belief that "anyone can make it" in the U.S. has taken a serious blow, now, as well.
So, people are happy to see "those privileged, job-exporting SOB's" take a hit. Or, put your own particular thinking to the generalized sentiment.
Or, below some of those expressions, perhaps people are just hopeful that if more people are in the same boat, things will improve for them. At least, they won't be so disadvantaged in terms of power and influence.
It's a pretty horrible feeling, being marginalized -- if it's not of your own choice and rationale. As well, feeling under constant, chronic stress; one slip, and you will lose what you have.
And frankly it would be dumb for China to pick too big a fight with Apple(and Foxxcon). There would be retaliation and rerouting.
And I'm sorry, we can't let China be a single point of failure. There's a freemarket saying that goes something like "if you don't let goods cross borders soon armies will"... but what if your goods(IP) is arming the armies across the border... and what if you don't have the capability of sourcing components to create arms for your military from friendly nations?
The economy is demonstrably structured so that only a small number benefit, whilst income has been stagnant for generations, and living standards have been declining because of rising healthcare costs.
Bringing down Apple may benefit nobody, but there is no longer any reason for most Americans to care about the success of American businesses since they can’t share in the prosperity.
Precisely. Many Fortune 100 US companies took the vast majority of their tax windfall/oversea cash and bought back the stock. Before you say most Americans own 401K's and have benefited from this - the relative increase in 401K's is dwarfed by the increase in housing prices and general inflation. Most Americans have experience single digit wage growth since the early 1980s, while the cost of pretty much everything has increased by double digits.
Most Americans are worse off today (from an earnings standpoint once you normalize it for inflation and purchasing power) than they were 30 years ago.
I think the reason this isn't more obvious is that technology has improved so rapidly that for just a few thousand dollars... maybe 5% of the average household's income, we can buy really fantastic technology products compared to previous generations. So these gadgets are helping to partially compensate for the loss of so much real wealth.
Even top-10% software engineers making $300k total compensation are really just achieving what I'd consider "normal slightly-upper middle class financial comfort". Ability to buy a modest home near their work, afford to have children and send them to college, etc.
Any American can invest in American companies. And even if they do not, they benefit from the taxes the companies pay. (And yes, they do pay their taxes -- they pay a whole lot of taxes.)
Apple certainly does pay their fair share of taxes, but this doesn’t do anything to change the economic structure.
Your facts are correct, but irrelevant.
Apple exists under the same tax regime as every other company and pays what is due. You can certainly argue for increasing taxes on various corporate activities, but to claim that Apple doesn’t pay it’s share is false.
Insurance is also a form of fair tax, when premiums are based on claim history and objective risk factors, and the market is reasonably competitive.
Can you show me a single example of a company paying more than it’s legally mandated share?
If not - why pick on Apple?
If Apple actually paid taxes on the money they made? If they didn't go over to china to pay cheaper labor and avoid enviromental regulations? Maybe you'd have a point. As is, they're just another parasite extracting as much wealth as they can in the name of creating the first quadrillionaire in history.
Apple pays taxes. Labor is cheaper in places other than China, but nowhere else has the ecosystem to support integration and assembly of consumer electronics. Apple is one of the few companies that is taking steps to ensure that their entire supply chain treats their workers well. And Apple has been an innovator when it comes to implementing environmentally friendly manufacturing practices and product packaging materials. Oh yeah, and they are making serious efforts to build enough renewable energy to offset their energy needs.
Companies like them are the reason we can borrow $20T at super low interest rates to continue the spend spend spend of the last 30 years while true parasites continue to scream "what can my country do for me" instead of "what can I do for my country".
Is it too big to fall?
New American car company trying to change the world (Tesla)? Nope, hope it fails.
Large American company that contributes massively to the enonomy doing well (Apple) Nope, they suck.
Someone wants to talk about Healthcare, or Education, or gun reform ? Nope, they suck.
Basically, in modern America, everything and everyone sucks. It's not a positive place to be.
http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/314750-trump-coins-2020...
+1 for making me laugh. On the other hand, I'm incredibly impressed by how he's handled the new peace with North Korea. I hope the work that's been happening there continues.
He outlined it very clearly as an inevitable shift from indefinite optimism to indefinite pessimism in his book "zero to one"
If you are studying the art of making a prophecy, leave it open ended and unspecific. It won't be falsifiable, and people will fill in the blanks with their preferred details.
And it doesn't help us with why some people are irrationally rooting against their own self-interest (Apple's contribution to the GDP, high representation in overall national savings), or why we are starting a trade war against the opinion of almost all experts (or what the motivations of the person starting this trade war are).
edit: and I should note, le plus ca change... "noblesse oblige" is an old phrase.
How long are we going to watch the economic elite be mystified as inequality skyrockets and the American people become more and more disenfranchised from the "success" of "American" firms like Facebook, Google, and Apple.
And yeah, a billionaire like Elon Musk who inherited his money from an apartheid state trying to "disrupt" the auto industry is not going to be taken to kindly, especially by anyone who's paying attention.
The ends do not justify the means.
Huh?
https://www.businessinsider.co.za/elon-musk-sells-the-family...
> “We were very wealthy,” says Errol. “We had so much money at times we couldn't even close our safe.”
I'll let you guess as to who dug up those emeralds. Hint: it wasn't the Musks.
Next step in your journey of learning is to look up when the Musks left South Africa. I bet you can figure it out without even looking it up.
1989 apparently, 5 years before the end of apartheid.
I don't think Elon Musk is a monster compared to his father, it's not even close really. But he is building his fortune on the back of inherited money earned doing some really scummy and shady shit.
I guess some people still take it literally?
It was a very popular idea amongst the far-left during the campaign and immediately after. Glenn Greenwald managed to write a 3000+ word treatise on the causes of the Brexit vote without once mentioning "immigration". I thought was quite the work of idealogical contortion and purity, but I don't think it's aged well at all. Plenty of people still seem to subscribe to these ideas though.
https://theintercept.com/2016/06/25/brexit-is-only-the-lates...
Production and value of the American machine has skyrocketed, but nobody I know has seen a proportional increase in income or value. Trickle-down has so MASSIVELY failed. We can't afford to root for the game, because we can't afford to PLAY the game.
When someone who basically swims in money says "But this will hurt the economy", what they really mean is "This will hurt a small section of some budget for me somewhere that you don't even benefit from, and even then, I'll just pass on the costs to you the consumer anyway"
It just feels unfair to the person who actually works for their money, instead of playing gambling games with investments.
It's easier to see undelivered promises right now in America than it is to see promised changed and progress.
A large population of Americans picture the American dream as post World War II high growth America, with an unstoppable economy, GM + Ford as the American Made Automobile, the Suburbs as the best place to live, coal and hydroelectric power, and being a World Leader with a clearly defined mission and enemy.
So, in essence, things that are not part of that image are new and "liberal" and ruining America. Whether that's Apple, solar panels, or innovative companies like Tesla.
You don’t need ‘nostalgia’ or whatever other descriptor will make people seem backward when you have the basic facts.
While, Ford substantially differentiated himself by realizing the pros of benefits for workers, the company existed in some dark times (WWI, Depression) where there would have been certain FUD. Moreso, Ford espouses its realization that it is at least part responsible for the suburbanization and ruin of Detroit.
Yet, few people today hate Ford.
What would settle this is if Tesla were to "pull it off", then we could see if it's blind nostalgia for what you mention, or a preference for simple and obvious utility and productivity.
Detroit churning out cars that move and employ Americans is a simpler win to process than the perpetually-almost-here future Musk may or may not be selling.
I bought a Model 3 and it is incredible. It is the only new car I've brought because I've never been excited enough about a car to take the depreciation hit. Driving this case makes me feel like I'm living in the future where everything makes sense and it makes me happy. But that's just me.
A lot of other people look at this car and see a dystopian nightmare of oppressive degradation and downfall. It makes them feel anxious, resentful and emasculated. For some, it is even a threat to their livelihoods.
So, same object, two opposing views. A utopia for some, a dystopia for others. In the old days there were a broad societal agreement on what "progress" was. Not so anymore.
I hope society once again agrees on what progress means some day, but I don't know if it will happen, nor how.
Why should someone care how apple is doing if they're struggling to make ends meet / have limited upward mobility.
Hint: that's most of us.
But I doubt many Americans would support global freedom of movement...
Because Apple is a tax dodging corporate behemoth that kowtows to the chinese and exploits slave labor? Because Apple sells overpriced garbage to people who don't know better?
> the company that comprises 3.94% of S&P 500, and is probably the single biggest holding of 401K retirement accounts.
You are really overstating AAPL significance in ordinary people's retirement portfolio. Most americans have an insignificant 401k account. I think I read that the median 401k value last year was $26K. Of that appl represents almost nothing for most investors/retirees.
> No American benefits if Apple falls.
What? Americans/american companies competing with Apple benefits. To say no american benefits isn't true. Hell Exxon's future has more impact on americans' lives. Doesn't mean we can't criticize it or support clean energy.
Apple is largely a widget company which produces expensive but nice technological baubles. If it fails we'll be fine.