[citation][nom]brucek2[/nom]Apple has something like 45,000 employees, the vast bulk of whom are the in the US. The ones I've met in Silicon Valley come off as well-paid, well-benefited, and thrilled with their jobs.Yes, Apple exports a lot (all?) of its manufacturing work overseas. Of course, they also sell a ton of product overseas: they are a global brand. Considering that the revenue and profits from all those sales are coming back here to the US, where it is providing a non-trivial portion of the above excellent jobs, as well as great returns for many US investors, I'm not sure the US should be begrudging other countries their share of the less-well-paying jobs.Finally, the reduced manufacturing cost makes these high demand goods more affordable to everyone. There are probably millions of US (and other) citizens benefiting today from their laptops, tablets, and phones which they might not have been able to afford had the manufacturing costs increased substantially.So a trade war here does not seem like it would ultimately benefit neither the US nor really any country (as is often the case.)[/citation]
The problem is, these large corporations don't return as much to the US as they probably should. The investors making the real money are the ones that had a large sum of money to invest. The rich get richer, alright fine. Americans making money should still filter down to everyone else, right?
Except the corporations making money are making enough money to hire the best lawyers and accountants. They find loopholes to cheat and legally pay less than smaller businesses. We don't live in a country where the poor are allowed to starve or die without treatment, so someone still has to pay the bill for social services through taxes. If the rich avoid the bill, it falls on the middle class to pay it. Since these people cut themselves such high bonuses, that money isn't sent down through the system to the people who designed, built, or sold that product. They deserve their cut just as much for the efforts they put in as the executive does, but they aren't going to get it. Again the middle class loses out most, since the lower class still has social services to turn to. As someone stated above, being an executive is basically just educated guessing. But even if they guess wrong and cost the company millions, the worst fate they can face is to leave with a severance package large enough to live on for life, not to mention what they've already been paid. Is someone going to be called a hero for pointing a dying man towards a hospital? All these CEOs do is point towards a direction, they don't contribute to the actual success.
So no, I don't think the profits returned directly improve the conditions of Americans. I think that having more middle to lower class jobs during a high unemployment period would help Americans. If the higher ups didn't get paid so much, they could afford a higher paid localized workforce. Perhaps if there were more factories in the US, there would have been an alternative when the auto industry failed. Some jobs don't translate well between auto and electronic manufacturing, but some could be trained and some are just basic assembly.
Let's just say though that having localized labor would still increase the retail costs of those items. They should cost more, as manufacturing them with cheaper outsourcing reduces the local market value, which in turn forces localized businesses to lower their prices to compete, which will force them to outsource themselves or cut costs by cutting quality/labor. If Wal Mart can mass produce beef using livestock factories, then the only way to compete at that price point is to get a livestock factory yourself or go out of the beef business. Outsourcing devalues everything for us.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram