Donald Trump on Apple: The Donald gets it wrong. Again.
First there was the building of the wall to keep out drug dealers and rapists from Mexico. Then we had the banning of all Muslims from entering the U.S.
We’ve also had the insults to the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the French Ambassador to the United States.
Now the man-who-would-be-president, and therefore defacto CEO of the world’s largest economy, is turning his attention to Apple, the biggest tech company in the world by market valuation.
Speaking at Liberty University, The Donald (as he likes to be known) said: “We’re gonna get Apple to start building their damn computers and things in this country, instead of in other countries.”
I know, right?!!!
I have five main issues with this ill-thought, cheap applause line:
1. He would not be able to stop a company such as Apple from having its products made and assembled anywhere it wants.
2. It shows a staggering lack of knowledge and awareness about how global trade and the global economy actually work in the 21st century.
3. He says he wants to bring final assembly line jobs back to America. This won’t happen (see point two above!) and it is disingenuous to tell American voters he can do this.
4. In addition, he should not be pushing so fervently for low paid, low skilled jobs – but higher paid and higher skilled jobs – for the American people. Most Americans would not wish to support their families on what these jobs would pay in today’s world. As Ark Hasseldahl points out: “Workers at China’s Foxconn, which manufactures the iPhone, make about $402 per month after three months of on-the-job probation. Even at the lowest minimum wage in the U.S. — $5.15 an hour in Wyoming — American workers can’t beat that.” And imagine the prices of Apple products for American consumers if this did happen.
5. And on a wider, more fundamental/dangerous level (dangerous in that it would be detrimental to the American economy and the global economy if he became president) he holds himself as a hero of capitalism and as being pro-business – yet his policies, such as imposing 35 per cent on imported goods, are the antithesis of this.