Trump Says Apple's Tim Cook Has Promised Him He'd Build Three US Factories: 'Big, Big, Big' (cnbc.com)

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that Apple CEO Tim Cook has committed to build three big manufacturing plants in the U.S., a surprising statement that would help fulfill his administration's economic goal of reviving American manufacturing. From a report: Apple CEO Tim Cook called Trump to share that the iPhone-maker would do more manufacturing domestically, Trump told WSJ. "I spoke to [Mr. Cook], he's promised me three big plants -- big, big, big," Trump was quoted as saying. Apple has already said that it would start a $1 billion fund to promote advanced manufacturing jobs in the United States. With its wide network of developers, Apple has already created two million jobs in the United States, according to Cook.

Comments

grain of salt

[gravewax]

"Apple has already created two million jobs in the United States, according to Cook", and that just proves Cook is full of shit. If they are 3 plants like the 2 million jobs those plants will include the truck manufacturer that builds the trucks that deliver the phones to the stores, the ship builder that provides the transport from china and the building material manufacturers for their shiters.

Re:grain of salt

[Goose In Orbit]

...and not one coal miner...

Re:grain of salt

[jellomizer]

Well it was their fault making fun of the nerds in middle school.

You piss me off, I automate your job away.

Re:grain of salt

[Penguinisto]

He's likely counting developers who are not employees, but who write code for iOS and MacOS/OSX/whichever-this-week.

(That used to be a thing, but honestly, ever since carbon.h came out way back in the day, you could write an app with C++ at its core and something Qt-ish for the UI, then cross-compile the same code to Macs and 'doze with not much effort. Not really sure if something similar could be done between iOS/Android, but given that most apps are what, just glorified web frames...?)

Re:grain of salt

[93 Escort Wagon]

All higher-profile entities make these sorts of claims. Large companies like Apple or Boeing or Walmart; sports franchises; even public universities like the one which employs me - they all claim that their presence in a local economy adds tens of thousands of ancillary jobs and introduces millions or billions of additional dollars into the local and/or regional economy. Usually when they do it, they're lobbying for tax breaks ("we'll build our new factory here if")... but it is also perfect fodder for politicians.

In my local (Puget Sound) area: Given the number of Seattle-area jobs, direct or ancillary, which are claimed to be due to the mere presence of Boeing, Amazon, U of W, etc. - I guess we're each unknowingly working full time at four or five places and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. That's the only way the numbers could possibly work..

Re:grain of salt

[GLMDesigns]

Does tech require steel? And how does one make steel? mmmm with coal.

Re:grain of salt

[sexconker]

save $40.00 a device for shipping from China

Uh...
How many iPhones do you think fit in a shipping container?

Re:grain of salt

[Captain Splendid]

And how does one make steel?

One does it in China, so that the environmental problems aren't yours to deal with.

Re:grain of salt

[SpammersAreScum]

How true. Fortunately, China's air and water never crosses its borders. Oh, and any government or civil unrest caused by such problems never will either. (Ok, maybe there's an implied /s in your post just as there is one in mine.)

Re:grain of salt

[GLMDesigns]

lol. :)

Yup. That's the answer.

Re:grain of salt

[Anonymous Coward]

... and sheltered billions in US dollars in off-shore accounts to avoid paying taxes.

Whoo hoo!

Re:grain of salt

[fahrbot-bot]

...and not one coal miner...

That may change when Apple releases the iPhone 10 Steam Punk Edition, which will actually run on coal.

Re:grain of salt

[DontBeAMoran]

Have you seen the size of the latest iPhones?

Sent from my iPhone 4.

Re:grain of salt

[Zaelath]

70% according to the coal lobby https://www.worldcoal.org/coal...

And even if you total "all other industrial" use of coal other than power, that's only 15% of the total coal being used in the US: https://www.eia.gov/totalenerg...

The other 85% was to produce 1/3 of US power, and that use is on the slide.

If you lose the power production, it won't even be economically viable to mine the 15%, it would be cheaper to buy it in from China.

Re:grain of salt

[supremebob]

Unfortunately, most of the jobs that Apple actually "created" in the US recently are low paying retail and support jobs at their Apple Store locations. The number of new hardware and software Engineers that Apple hired are probably a small percentage of the real number.

Re:grain of salt

[SeaFox]

"already created" 2 million jobs? apple, inc. themselves only has 116,000 employees worldwide. that must include the total u.s. employees of every company or retailer that sells apple products or some other bullshit made-up news like that.. including walmart's million+.

no fucking way apple, inc. has 'created' 2 million jobs in this country.

Apple's taking credit for all the people involved in iOS development. So those developers and even support people simply answering user emails, getting their paycheck from a completely different company, are jobs Apple created, according to them.

Re:grain of salt

[pointybits]

This figure is itemised on the Apple site. Basically they're claiming every job that touches Apple in some way, e.g. the workers at Caterpillar that make the generators used in Apple's data centers. 1.5 million of them are "jobs created and supported by the App store", which is sourced from a report that uses a really broad definition of an App Economy worker and includes support workers and "spillover" jobs.

Re:grain of salt

[crunchygranola]

This is a common tactic for industries and big businesses -- claiming anyone that has any contact with their product in any capacity other than as a simple consumer has a job "created" by them. The American Petroleum Institute claims that oil companies employ 9.5 million people but everyone in any retail business that has a gas pump or sells oil off the shelf is one of those people. By the same token the farm lobby counts anyone who deals with any agricultural product is employed by "farming". So if you work in a 7-11 you are employed both by the petroleum industry and the farm industry (since both types of products are sold), and if they add Apple iPhone cables to their inventory, they would be employed by Apple too!

Re:grain of salt

[arglebargle_xiv]

"Apple has already created two million jobs in the United States, according to Cook", and that just proves Cook is full of shit.

No, it proves that Trump is full of shit. This came from Trump, not Cook. We have to see what Cook actually said, not what Trump said he said, before we can comment on it.

Re:grain of salt

[Enigma2175]

The reply right above yours, posted 47 minutes before yours, has a link to the Apple site where they claim to have created 2 million jobs. This isn't a Trump number, it's an Apple number. It looks like they are counting the employees of any company that makes an IOS app as a job they created.

Re:grain of salt

[rtb61]

The government is in a position to enforce those claims by the simple expedient of secure by design rules. That design being all electronics in government must be produced in secured audited facilities to ensure security and sound requirement, that includes hardware and software. All required to be produced, where it can be inspected to ensure not trojan horses, either software or hardware. Those requirements can extend further into industry by mandating them for power generation.

For security reasons it is extremely difficult to argue against, as the simplest component can be embedded with an extra bit that, say causes that component to become dysfunctional upon receipt of an encoding signal.

Now, as a lot of security is just theatre to control the masses and to feed the war industrial complex, that demand cheap imports to inflate profits, confusion will reign supreme.

Re:grain of salt

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it is typical of American's to delight in others misery

If this is true, why isn't there a single word for it in English? And why IS there a word for it in German - "schadenfreude"?

Re:grain of salt

[Voyager529]

Unfortunately, most of the jobs that Apple actually "created" in the US recently are low paying retail and support jobs at their Apple Store locations. The number of new hardware and software Engineers that Apple hired are probably a small percentage of the real number.

You say this like it's a bad thing. Apple has its problems, but they do tend to pay measurably more than minimum wage. The non-engineers of the world need jobs as well, and "get a STEM degree" is unlikely to be a viable course of action for the overwhelming majority of them for no shortage of reasons. If Apple can provide gainful employment for those who don't have a master's degree in electrical engineering, and do so while keeping their customer satisfaction levels high and their profits up, then I fail to see who loses in that scenario.

Re: grain of salt

[PoopJuggler]

Which taxes has Apple not paid that they are legally required to? Specifically.

Re:grain of salt

[Anonymous Coward]

And destroy the country...so you can become a billionaire who thinks slavery is flexible factory workers and has no idea what the difference is.

Why should he/she care?

You bullied then and are getting payback now.

He/she was bullied then and is getting revenge now.

Plus, getting rich at the expense of others is the very definition of success in the good old US, isn't it?

Payback is a bitch, and so are you.

Suck it up.

(I am only partly joking. I leave is as an exercise for you to figure out which part it is. You will likely fail.)

Re:grain of salt

[lisaparratt]

Other than epicaricacy, you mean?

Re:grain of salt

[gtall]

War industrial complex? Let's to some figures, shall we: U.S. GDP is roughly $19 Trillion. The U.S. DoD bill is roughly $700 Billion. Of that, about 1/2 is personnel costs. About 1/4 is upkeep on physical plant, electricity, fuel, etc. That leaves, putting it generously, about $200 for your "war industrial complex"...out of a $19 Trillion dollar economy. Wow! That's some "war industrial complex" you have there in your head.

Re:grain of salt

[d.w.mitchell.55]

Mostly with Arc Furnaces these days. Coal is only needed when working with iron ore. Scrap steel is processed more efficiently in an arc furnace.

Re:grain of salt

[someone1234]

Yep, coal mining on the Moon has a great future!

Re:grain of salt

[AmiMoJo]

Strange, the report doesn't mention the millions of Apple internet shill jobs... Maybe they count as volunteers.

Re:grain of salt

[coofercat]

Whenever Trump uses any superlative, he's essentially lying about it. "We're going to make the best golf course in the world" (or similar - can't be arsed to look it up) - not true.

"Working on major Trade Deal with the United Kingdom. Could be very big & exciting. JOBS! The E.U. is very protectionist with the U.S. STOP!" - means "working on a small deal, which will probably fuck over as many people as it helps"

"A big, beautiful wall" - well, I think we know how that one is going ;-)

Trump-slagging aside, my point is, if he can do it, then why can't we all (Tim Cook included)? We're in the era of 'fake news', so just bluff your way as much as you need and let the fact checkers pour over your work at a later date.

Re:grain of salt

[GLMDesigns]

Coal is becoming less and less profitable to produce power thanks to natural gas (fracking).

For the most part the only coal that we truly "need" for the foreseeable future is to make steel. .

Coal mines are independent of each other - miner extracts coal from coal seams and sends it to the steel mill. Economy of scale matters matters less here. (I'm not in the industry so this is speculation.) .

I think we all want to see the end of coal. We're seeing it disappear for general power generation the only major use left is steel. Maybe one day one of the alternative methods will work. But we're talking about in the here and now: 2017.

Re:grain of salt

[GLMDesigns]

Correct. But then we're already dealing with existing steel and not making new steel from iron ore.

I'm not a fan of coal. I would like to see it gone for power generation and steel production. But for now we cannot make steel at an economical price without it. No steel. No cities. No train. No lots of things.

Re:grain of salt

[jbengt]

I'm not a fan of coal. I would like to see it gone for power generation and steel production. But for now we cannot make steel at an economical price without it. No steel. No cities. No train. No lots of things.

No coal, No steel, No problem: Just use carbon nano-tubes and graphite!

Re:grain of salt

[torkus]

I'm pretty sure he's talking about all the developers selling apps (or freemium apps) in the app store.

With that said, Apple does have a large footprint. Shipping 100m iphones isn't something trucking wave off. Sourcing parts for said devices is a non-trivial task involving many people. Selling, supporting, etc. said devices, again, involves a lot of people. Add in the 3rd party repair shops, people selling related services, etc. and you DO have quite a few people

I'd say most of those 2m jobs are still their app store developers but in the larger bucket, apple represents a non-trivial percentage of a lot of industries related to the products they sell.

Re:grain of salt

[apoc.famine]

*organic, sustainable coal.

Re:grain of salt

[KingBenny]

bag of salt ... so if they do that considering the wages your next iPhone will cost anywhere between 1500 and 3000 bucks ? well its a groupie thing anyway isnt it ... seeing is believing, millions of jobs huh ? in three factories ? thats REALLY big big BIG big big ... 20 years ago when i was putting plastic boxes in cardboard boxes 8 hours a night at 90% of the wage (since the state sponsoring required they give me education (which meant putting said boxes in boxes for three days by day before it was by night) there was like ... definitely less than 100 people there ... now the factory's actually gone ... theres just a storehouse which probably has about ... ten people in it ?
seeing is believing, cook--san

Re:grain of salt

[rtb61]

GDP - gross domestic product, which is turnover and not profit. My mind boggles at the crazy idea that somehow you think taxes are paid on turnover rather than on profit. That is such war industrial complex thinking, just like demanding war spending by NATO the North American Territorial Occupation farce countries must be 2% of the nations GDP sounds so low doesn't. When you do the numbers and poke through a countries GDP to find out what the actually taxable profit was and how much actual tax was paid, all of a sudden that 2% of GDP becomes 20% to 30% of income taxes (especially taking into account offshoring profits where a countries GDP goes up but not one cent of tax is paid, whilst it's economy is strip minded of capital, typical of the majority of major US corporations as US parasites on it's vassal states with US occupational forces on hand to control 'er' protect those foreign governments). Lies upon lies upon lies to feed insatiable psychopathic greed.

All 100% automated.

[jellomizer]

All these plants would be in 100% automated in States and Cities where they will be Tax exempt, which will be making B2B products so there is no sales tax.

Re:All 100% automated.

[perpenso]

Yes there will be a high degree of automation. Even so there will be some jobs. Some dealing with phones, some dealing with the robots. But the equally important part is that a pile of money will stay in the US and contribute to domestic activity, not over seas activity.

Re:All 100% automated.

[fustakrakich]

B2B

'Big to Big'?

Re:All 100% automated.

[aitikin]

But the equally important part is that a pile of money will stay in the US and contribute to domestic activity, not over seas activity.

Who do you think you're talking about? Apple has over $250 billion in cash that they have pretty much purely horded. What makes you think they're going to suddenly start spending that money?

Yes there will be a high degree of automation. Even so there will be some jobs. Some dealing with phones, some dealing with the robots.

Yeah...that's not much in the way of employment and none of them are really manufacturing jobs which are what were promised. Hell, dealing with the robots hardly even qualifies as a blue collar type job as it's presumably far more tech oriented. And that assumes Apple doesn't outsource that aspect of their factory to already existing professionals.

So, really, the only boon from this would be the construction (short term), the dozen phone operators that they'd need (remember, this is an internal business facility), the dozen plant supervisors they need on hand in case of a fire, and the freight trucks that are used to ship it (although, I don't know that that would be much of an increase vs Apple's current shipping with their partners there).

Re:All 100% automated.

[perpenso]

But the equally important part is that a pile of money will stay in the US and contribute to domestic activity, not over seas activity.

Who do you think you're talking about? Apple has over $250 billion in cash that they have pretty much purely horded. What makes you think they're going to suddenly start spending that money?

I'm not referring to that money. I'm referring to the money that would otherwise be spent on overseas manufacturing and overseas shipping. In other words I'm pointing out that it makes an economic difference where activity takes places, domestically or overseas.

Yes there will be a high degree of automation. Even so there will be some jobs. Some dealing with phones, some dealing with the robots.

Yeah...that's not much in the way of employment and none of them are really manufacturing jobs which are what were promised.

Not all jobs at a manufacturing plant are assembly, fabrication, etc; even back in the day. My grandfather "boiled the water" for the steam turbines that generated the electricity for the manufacturing plant. It was still a manufacturing job. People, and robots, who do fabrication and assembly need support.

Hell, dealing with the robots hardly even qualifies as a blue collar type job as it's presumably far more tech oriented.

My tour of Siemens in Germany suggests otherwise. Highly trained technicians are blue collar jobs.

And that assumes Apple doesn't outsource that aspect of their factory to already existing professionals.

A friend from college has a company supporting local automated manufacturing and packaging companies. He's very busy. He misses half of our occasional weekend get togethers, his wife and kids showing up without him, his wife explaining that something somewhere broke and they have to get the line up and running fast.. If another company came to him with an offer of additional work he would have to hire more employees.

So, really, the only boon from this would be the construction (short term), the dozen phone operators that they'd need (remember, this is an internal business facility), the dozen plant supervisors they need on hand in case of a fire, and the freight trucks that are used to ship it (although, I don't know that that would be much of an increase vs Apple's current shipping with their partners there).

The history of robotic and automation in Germany suggests otherwise, at least according to the folks at Siemens.

Re:All 100% automated.

[rkordmaa]

If you have a clue what a phone factory looks like you understand that these will not appear in US. Apple might build something else in US, but not phones. You can't get people in developed countries to work in these types of factories. In a developed country, its better to be unemployed than to do work like that. I would rather live under a bridge than waste my life sitting by a manufacturing line repeating the same damn motion year after year. And phone manufacturing is a hard thing to automate, you can automate many parts of it, but there is still a lot of manual labor that goes into putting a phone together and you can't get rid of it.

Re:All 100% automated.

[perpenso]

If you have a clue what a phone factory looks like you understand that these will not appear in US. Apple might build something else in US, but not phones.

Actually I'm quite familiar with Apple's FoxConn factories. And no, Apple will not be replicating that approach in the US. In case you missed the previous comments in this thread and the subject line, any manufacturing Apple does in the US will likely be highly automated. What little they currently do in the US with respect to the Mac Pro (small production runs, high priced) is not likely to be an approach replicated in these new factories. Also keep in mind that these factories are *not* going to be supply the global supply chain like the Chinese factories. Apple is facing political pressure in various regions to build locally. They may have to open factories in India to make progress in that market and get past political and social barriers. They have to continue manufacturing in China for the Chinese market. And these US factories don't have to fulfill the complete demand for phones in the US.

And phone manufacturing is a hard thing to automate, you can automate many parts of it, but there is still a lot of manual labor that goes into putting a phone together and you can't get rid of it.

That is why Apple has been researching robotic disassembly in an effort to recycle materials. Disassembly is a step in the more complicated assembly direction.

And in unrelated news

[Arkham]

Trump is a fucking liar, so nothing he says can be taken as having anything to do with the truth.

Re:And in unrelated news

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah of course, take everything he says with a grain of salt. More likely Cook said they would look into it, and Trump heard whatever he wanted to hear.

The other option is this is a setup so when it doesn't happen he has a new person to bash once he's done flogging Jeff Sessions.

Re: And in unrelated news

[RazorSharp]

Apple already planned to start manufacturing more in the U.S. Like many other companies that are pulling out of China, it most likely had to do with the increase in automation. Cheap Chinese labor isn't worth so much when you mainly employ robots. Not to mention the Chinese economy has matured and their currency is worth more than it used to, so that benefit is diminished as well.

Furthermore, U.S. manufacturing is good PR, automated or not. Telling our doofus of a president about it is also a free way to get it all over the news and rake in sales from the half-wits who voted for him.

Re:And in unrelated news

[HiThere]

While your comment is true, that's not to say that corporations don't make fraudulent promises when angling for a tax or legal break. I can't tell which one is lying.

Re:And in unrelated news

[sit1963nz]

Maybe Apple is going to get into the t-shirt business so Trump can fill the shops in his golf courses and hotels with stuff made in the USA instead of China.

The shirts will come in
Trump hands, small, regular , big, bigly, biglier, and bigliest

Re:And in unrelated news

[zippthorne]

I seem to recal some articles about Apple having had (speculative?) plans to create some kind of (highly automated) domestic factory since well before the election, so maybe President Trump didn't talk to Cook and simply was briefed on that? or read an article on that?

Re: And in unrelated news

[jbengt]

Obama did not foster identity politics and class hatred. The current set of "Republicans" did, and they doubled down on it when a black man got elected president.

And the Jobs . . .

[Slim Boom]

Will all be filled by H1B Visa holders.

How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[mykepredko]

Saying that you're going to make a "big" factory doesn't mean anything as it will be years of site selection, environmental impact reports, etc.

If Mr. Cook wanted Apple to show that they cared about the countries they do business in as well as make an immediate impact, they would stop offshoring their profits and pay taxes on them in the country they made the money.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[MightyMartian]

Not to mention that the factory will be heavily automated, meaning the number of jobs that it actually provides will be relatively insignificant. Trump made a lot of promises to blue collar workers that the march of technology render unkeepable. Even if somehow magically coal recovers, the number of people employed would be a fraction of the number employed a quarter century ago, and of course, coal isn't coming back, so it's really an academic question.

It would be nice if a political candidate would go to a town hall meeting in the Rust Belt or in coal country and say "Look, I sympathize with you, and the loss of your jobs to other countries is a sad, but inevitable consequence of the changes of manufacturing that have occurred over the last thirty years. The fact is that even if new factories/mines are built tomorrow, the overwhelming majority of you will not be rehired, and it is likely that many of you who are currently employed will lose your jobs, or, at best, will retire and those positions deemed redundant. It's time to move on from a 20th century economy, and I commit to bringing economic development into your region, into job retraining, and making your lives more affordable."

But no, all these regions get is a lot of blowhards shouting how somehow they have the magic power to turn back time (and it isn't just the Republicans).

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[Luthair]

No, the way it works is they sell an offshore subsidiary their IP then their US corp pays royalties on the IP they license from the offshore subsidiary wiping out their profits in the US.

One version of that scheme is Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[Dragonslicer]

Ugh, UI fail. This is definitely not Redundant.

Here's a symbolic +1 Insightful.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[precisenz]

Just how many iPhones do you think Ireland buys?!. Apple (and Google and Microsoft and every other large tech company... ) pay minimal tax in the countries they sell their products, via a series of tax setups & company structures that allow them to take the profits out of the country the money is made before it is considered "profit", to a country where less tax has to be paid. This isn't new - global corporations have been doing forever. Whats changed is that software & IP is a lot more valuable and easy to shift over borders & the numbers are now staggering so it gets noticed.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[Areyoukiddingme]

If Mr. Cook wanted Apple to show that they cared about the countries they do business in as well as make an immediate impact, they would stop offshoring their profits and pay taxes on them in the country they made the money.

This is Apple playing Trump. "Let us repatriate our hoarded cash for 0.01% tax and we'll build three factories in the US. Big big big! Pinky swear!" They get their money back into the States, having successfully robbed the US taxpayer, then drag their feet on the factories for three years until Trump is out of office, whereupon they shitcan the project. And Trump won't even notice, because Fox and Friends won't report it.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[imgod2u]

"So for example, I'm the only candidate which has a policy about how to bring economic opportunity using clean renewable energy as the key into coal country. Because we're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business, right?

And we're going to make it clear that we don't want to forget those people. Those people labored in those mines for generations, losing their health, often losing their lives to turn on our lights and power our factories.

Now we've got to move away from coal and all the other fossil fuels, but I don't want to move away from the people who did the best they could to produce the energy that we relied on."

We had one. She lost.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[galabar]

We could lower corporate taxes so that they don't feel the need to keep their money out of the US.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[tlhIngan]

Just how many iPhones do you think Ireland buys?!. Apple (and Google and Microsoft and every other large tech company... ) pay minimal tax in the countries they sell their products, via a series of tax setups & company structures that allow them to take the profits out of the country the money is made before it is considered "profit", to a country where less tax has to be paid. This isn't new - global corporations have been doing forever. Whats changed is that software & IP is a lot more valuable and easy to shift over borders & the numbers are now staggering so it gets noticed.

Ireland is special - it's treated as Europe as far as anyone is concerned. So all the Irish profits Apple makes are really Europe profits. Yes, Apple has a pile of cash outside the US, because it was legitimately earned outside the US - hell, even Apple realizes China is a bigger market than the US these days

Sure they do the IP licensing thing, but they're not, because most of the IP is generated in the US, and they pay US wages for that (thus, the profit they make in the US goes into funding development in the US and they have to pay US taxes on it). Of course, this is only a quick move away - should something like anti-encryption laws get enacted, forcing the encryption and security parts

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

Per your link: "Due largely to international pressure and the publicity surrounding Google's and Apple's uses of the double Irish with a Dutch sandwich, the Irish finance minister, in the 2015 budget, passed measures to close the loopholes and effectively end the use of the double Irish with a Dutch sandwich for new tax plans. Companies with established structures will continue to benefit from the old system until 2020."

Of course, they will come up with some other tax avoidance scheme by then. I'm surprised that several of these megacorps aren't secretly planning some "corporate moon colony" with the extra cash so they can completely "extract the wealth" from the planet.

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

A corp's primary goal is profit. Your idea would just become a "race to the bottom" going all the way to "zero corporate taxes", and then into the negative with various tax breaks. There are already several corps that manage to pay no income tax in 2015.

Re: How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[PoopJuggler]

Apple has not robbed the US, Congress has. Apple pays every bit of tax legally required of them. Blame Congress for the tax code that favors the rich (ie, themselves).

Re:How about bringing in the off shore cash pile?

[imgod2u]

If that's what you understood from that quote (and I'll grant you the words were poorly chosen) you may need to brush up on reading comprehension. It seems pretty obvious "we" is America in that context.

Which basically translates into exactly what you said. Only not spelled out excessively so even the most drooling idiot could understand.

2 million jobs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Right Timmy, time to go back to school and learn some basic number crunching.

These plants, after construction and a temporary surge of a few 100 jobs during said construction, will employ maybe a couple dozen people across all their plants.

GO TRUMP!!!! Clueless idiot

Re:2 million jobs?

[jellomizer]

The plant will be cloning Steve Jobs.... What is the problem?

Re:2 million jobs?

[cmdr_klarg]

GO TRUMP!!!!

Take Pence, DeVos, and Mnuchin with you!

Can you say Carrier and Indiana?

[Anonymous Coward]

Thought so.

Same lie, different day. Nothing to see here. Move along

MS shut down Surface plant

[fermion]

$20,000 surface hub. Should have been profitable. Sales were enourmous. Hundres(s) of jobs lost. Likely went to china.

Lack of Manufacturing in the US has more to do with workers wanting 8 hour days, lots of time off, and high pay. Nothing wrong with that, just hard to compete when they can get cushy office jobs at the same pay. Immigrants can do it, as they do with meat packing, but when hire immigrants here when you can hire them cheaper at home? Which is why Trump makes so much stuff in Mexico.

Re:MS shut down Surface plant

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

Per that logic, Europe must have no manufacturing at all, right? Because the average EU worker has 2x vacation and takes 300+ more hours off than the US.

That sounds great but...

[Gravis Zero]

how long until people start throwing themselves off the roof? ;)

Re:That sounds great but...

[freeze128]

If the factories are made by Apple, then the buildings will have tractor beams to catch the falling workers.

Trump is a child

[linuxguy]

Everything good. He deserves the credit. Everything bad. Obama's fault.

"big big big"

Re:Trump is a child

[wonkey_monkey]

What I love is how in every shot I've seen of him either walking to or from a helicopter, he claps his hands together as if his (not very) inner toddler is going "Yaaay, hewicoptah!"

Re:Trump is a child

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget Hillary. All politics aside, the "man" is just an overgrown man-child, who throws tantrums whenever he doesn't get his way, constantly whines about how unfair everything is, and is so convinced that he's a "winner" who succeeds at everything he does, nothing that goes wrong is ever his fault. It's either some mess he inherited from Obama, or Hillary is the real criminal everyone should be looking at, or the Republicans in Congress who are not doing enough. Whatever it is, there's always some kind of external force at work, it's never him.

The really sad thing is the stories that come out about how the people who prepare the intelligence briefings -- very important stuff for a President -- have learned they need to find ways to put Trump's name into the briefing so he'll keep reading.

Trump is someone who's had pretty much everything handed to him his whole life, and he seems to have had this idea in his head that the POTUS was some sort of autocrat a la Putin. Now that he's starting to learn the hard way that he can't just threaten to fire any member of Congress who doesn't go along with his agenda, like he could in the private world, he throws tantrums like a spoiled brat toddler.

Re: Trump is a child

[Zero__Kelvin]

He loves to show how he's "got all the best words". "What words should I use to say it isn't just big?". Oh, I know, stack 3 "bigs" ... That's our Sex Offender in Chief!

Re:Trump is a child

[blindseer]

Pretty sure it's Bush's fault. Worked for Obama, didn't it?

Re:Trump is a child

[linuxguy]

"Pretty sure it's Bush's fault. Worked for Obama, didn't it?"

Do you remember Obama constantly acting like a vindictive child?

Me neither.

Re: Trump is a child

[Zero__Kelvin]

Hi Tiny Fingers! (Or should I say Tiny, Tiny, Tiny Fingers?)

Re:Trump is a child

[MoarSauce123]

Actually, it is Reagan's fault. His economic policies were so massively destructive that the US lost the lead in many areas. Trump employing the same approach makes it only worse.

Re:Trump is a child

[painandgreed]

Do you remember Obama constantly acting like a vindictive child?

Me neither.

Well, coming from Trump country, I can tell you that the people there think that is because Obama was just putting up a fake front of a con man. Trump however is just telling it how it is because that's what they would want to say. Read into that what you will.

Many Apple phones shipped by air ...

[perpenso]

save $40.00 a device for shipping from China

Uh... How many iPhones do you think fit in a shipping container?

Online orders seem to ship by air. You can follow your phone online as it moves from China to Alaska to the lower 48, assuming you are in the lower 48.

Tim did promise 3 plants.

[Anonymous Coward]

He really meant azaleas. Those things can get huge!

Re:Tim did promise 3 plants.

[avandesande]

He was also going to open a Canary, but it PETA got wind of that so they nixed the idea...

Don't count your factories until they're built

[interdyne]

Trump has a way of jumping to conclusions, saying things out of context and lying. I'll be a lot more convinced this is happening when Apple says it is. They have economic incentive to build their heavier products here in the US like the Mac Pro and CTO iMacs. How many more heavy products that can and will build in the US, that remains to be seen.

"Trump says..." Stopped reading there

[Anonymous Coward]

To say that he has a... "casual acquaintance with truth and reality" is an understatement.

If that gang of sociopaths tell you it's July and the sky is blue, begin to doubt the existence of seasons and colors.

Re:"Trump says..." Stopped reading there

[ClickOnThis]

To say that he has a... "casual acquaintance with truth and reality" is an understatement.

If that gang of sociopaths tell you it's July and the sky is blue, begin to doubt the existence of seasons and colors.

You can say that again.

Everywhere jobs but not a drop for the uneducated

[Annatar22]

So Trump's supporters think this is keeping his promise? Most of these factories will be heavily automated. The 'manufacturing' jobs are not going to go to struggling Joe-Blow the former coal miner, or laid off steel worker. They are highly technical jobs requiring education and training none of these guys possess. More often than not this will likely go to even more H1B visa holders, rather than the folks who are holding Trump up like some kind of champion to the common working man. Maybe we get a few more jobs cleaning toilets, but since those tend to get contracted out to service companies with somewhat shady hiring practices I'm still not seeing a net gain.

At the end of the day they're still struggling, but I guess Trump gets to check off that box.

Caveat Emptor

[WillAffleckUW]

Look, the guy has a track record of lying. Like 90-95 percent of the time.

Best case scenario is 1/20th the jobs show up and 2/3 of the plants are in Mexico and Canada, and the American plant is actually located in a US Possession or Protectorate but not actually in the US itself.

Argue w/ these facts from his site

[Anonymous Coward]

Roger Stone is a seasoned political operative, speaker, pundit, and New York Times Bestselling Author featured in the Netflix documentary "Get me Roger Stone". A veteran of ten national presidential campaigns, he served as a senior campaign aide to three Republican presidents: Nixon, Reagan and, to his regret, Bush. An outspoken libertarian, he is the author of the New York Times bestseller âoeThe Man Who Killed Kennedy: The Case Against LBJâ, the Clinton's War on Women, The Bush Crime Family, and the Making of the President 2016- How Donald Trump Orchestrated a Revolution. Mr. Stone has written for Fox Opinion, Infowars, Breitbart News, StoneZone, the Daily Caller, and the New York Times. A well-known voice in politics for over forty years, Roger Stone often gives insights on behind-the-scenes political agendas at StoneColdTruth.com and StoneZone.com, as well as InfoWars.com, where he hosts an hour long show every Wednesday at 3 pm ET. Follow him at StoneColdTruth.com.

A{Roger Stone is a seasoned political operative, speaker, pundit, and New York Times Bestselling Author featured in the Netflix documentary "Get me Roger Stone". A veteran of ten national presidential campaigns, he served as a senior campaign aide to three Republican presidents: Nixon, Reagan and, to his regret, Bush. An outspoken libertarian, he is the author of the New York Times bestseller âoeThe Man Who Killed Kennedy: The Case Against LBJâ, the Clinton's War on Women, The Bush Crime Family, and the Making of the President 2016- How Donald Trump Orchestrated a Revolution. Mr. Stone has written for Fox Opinion, Infowars, Breitbart News, StoneZone, the Daily Caller, and the New York Times. A well-known voice in politics for over forty years, Roger Stone often gives insights on behind-the-scenes political agendas at StoneColdTruth.com and StoneZone.com, as well as InfoWars.com, where he hosts an hour long show every Wednesday at 3 pm ET. Follow him at StoneColdTruth.com.

APK

P.S.=> We'll SEE who the MORON is here, you moron... apk

Re:so 6 people will be employed in the US

[Hognoxious]

Nah. A man and a dog.

The dog's job is to bit the man if he touches the controls.
The man's job is to open the cans of dog food.

2 million jobs

[manu0601]

I assume Tim Cook refers to 2 million developers of third party apps? How many of them can pay the bills with that?

Re:You appear to be the liar here... apk

[fredrated]

A list of trivialities, most actually due to Obama since Trump hasn't done anything that makes a difference.

Did Cook tell Trump also...

[MoarSauce123]

....that he is holding it wrong? US factories? That would cut into the piggish profit margin! Aside from that, Trump should make his clothing stuff in US factories first rather than rely on Chinese sweat shops....yes, yes, I know, he has no longer a say in Trump Enterprises *cough*

Re:And what will they manufacture here?

[MoarSauce123]

That will be 799$ with a three year contract.

Re:BOARD THE TRUMP TRAIN!

[MoarSauce123]

Where? The coal miners in PA who elected Trump are still waiting on getting their jobs back that Reagonomics eliminated. Maybe they stay naive and vote Trump again.

Re:Everywhere jobs but not a drop for the uneducat

[MoarSauce123]

The uneducated get added to the White House science staff or get a cushy job as Republican Senator. Having inherited rich like Trump does help.

he's promised me three big plants

[dcarmi]

A couple of Aspidistras and a lovely Bamboo.

So?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, amazing. So we ship off all of the knowledge jobs overseas and turn ourselves into third world physical labor and manufacturing and assembly plants again. Way to go, America!

Laughable...

[Timothy2.0]

Cook taking credit for 2 million developers just shows you a) how easy it is to manipulate Trump, and b) well...see a).

If I develop an iPhone app, some worthless game I sell for a pittance, I'm technically part of that "2 million developers" group. How many of those people are earning a wage comparable to industry standard? How many of those are hobbyists and dabblers? If Cook's going to make a claim of creating 2 million jobs, then let's look at the wages/salaries of those jobs.

So Cook's slated $1 billion to promote manufacturing jobs in the US...Foxconn spent $2.6 billion building *a single factory* to support its work for Apple. To suggest Cook's going to whip out the checkbook to build three factories *just* to provide Americans with jobs is a slap in the face to the shareholders who demand an uptick in the share price and low wages in China to push up profits and dividends.