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Comment by doctorwho | Hacker News Reader

This is pathetic. Apple attempts to justify huge markups on cheap foreign labour by boasting about how many jobs it has created at home. Pure bullshit. It has tocreate those jobs to sustain its business. It does not have to use foreign labour, but it does because it's cheaper. If they could outource their entire operation and see X times profi, you can be absolutely sure they would. In a heartbeat.

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It's not just that the labour is cheap. The manufacturing in China is far more integrated and nimble than it is in America. China is winning on more than just price.

See this article: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and...

Also, Apple isn't justifying its huge margins. Everyone who buys an Apple product is.

Apple is TRYING to justify it. If they didn't care about the negative publicity they would not have put that site up. I'm not disputing the fact that it's cheaper to do this stuff overseas, just that Apple is not being honest and just saying that, instead they're trying to steer (SPIN) the conversation so they look good instead of greedy.

I don't understand why people get mad at Apple. Get mad at American consumers for demanding, no worse, feeling entitled to paying extremely low prices for very high tech things. Apple could use American manufacturing and either produce crap at low profits, or extremely expensive gadgets no one could afford. Instead, they produce millions of devices people want and buy, then have to explain themselves for not employed good old fashioned American labor in their factories.

They're creating high tech, high-skilled jobs (product design, software development, hardware diagnosis and repair) at home, and outsourcing the low-tech low-skilled jobs to foreigners.

I'm happy they're doing well. They have made smart business decisions and some great products. I just wish they'd stop trying to spin everything. They made the decision to ship jobs overseas and that was good for their bottom line, but instead of talking about that, they talk about how many US jobs they've created. It's not an honest conversation.

It's not that people feel entitled to paying extremely low prices. People will just go with the cheapest option. I don't go with cheaper options because I feel entitled. I go with cheaper options because I want to save money.

They once did create expensive gadgets no one could afford. Macs used to cost a lot more than PCs. Then Apple moved labor overseas, started pricing their products competitively, and now they have the highest market cap.

and when FOXconn switches to robotic factories in the next 3 years than what will be your complaint? What that Japan is making money selling and out-fitting those factories?

This is not on Apple..America lost the Automation race to Japan by being very strategically stupid

Apple is not to blame for that mistake

It's not about blame, it's about being honest about why you're doing something. Apple is not being honest, they never have. Secrecy and spin rule the world at Apple. I don't care if you hire child robots to work in your factories, just don't try and blow sunshine up my ass about why you're doing it. They're a big greedy corporation that likes money. That's the story.

They're a big greedy corporation that likes money. That's the story.

They're a big, successful corporation that likes to create great products and great customer experiences. Greed gets you Goldman Sachs or something. Greed doesn't inspire companies to improve customer service by keeping their support hotlines based in the US, it inspires them to outsource their hotlines to poor, nominally "English-speaking" countries overseas. The greedy PC and phone manufacturers didn't build expensive, high-end retail stores, they just shipped all their crap to big box stores, Amazon, and the carrier stores.

It turns out that Apple is profitable, because people like all those things Apple splurged on. So call it enlightened self-interest, but greed, in the sense of cutting corners to reduce costs, it is not. The next time you call Dell's customer service and end up talking to someone called "Mike" who has a suspiciously thick South Asian accent, or the next time you try to call Google's customer service before realizing it doesn't exist, you'll understand what mere greed leads people to do.

You sound angry.

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