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General discussion

Do you think it's fair just to pick on Apple?

Feb 6, 2012 9:22AM PST

To give you some context to this poll, read this blog here:
Would you boycott Apple?

Do you think it is fair for consumers just to pick on Apple for this?

- Yes. (Please explain.)
- No. (Please explain.)
- Don't care. (Why not?)

Discussion is locked

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The real problem is not China, It is the American Unions
Feb 10, 2012 11:00AM PST

The real problem is not China, It is the American Unions that have destroyed the manufacturing here in America. With all the outrageous pay, severance pay, retirement and medical programs it has forced American business along with the high taxes to look elsewhere to lower cost to keep competitive with the world market.
U.S.compaies pay higher taxes here in American than any where else in the world. Everyone always want the other person to get screwed with taxes but when corporations are taxed they simply pass it on in the way of higher cost to the consumers. Taxes are just a cost of business. All business must make a profit in order to stay in business. Yes I do agree many executive salaries and packages are as outrageous as some professional athletes.
That is exactly why so many municapilities are going broke with the outageous retirement benifits and cost associated with them. GM went into bankruptcy for the main reason to get out from under the outrageous employment benifits package that ruined their company. American AIrlines is also trying to shed the benifits package anchor.

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Boo Hoo, Sob Sob
Feb 10, 2012 4:18PM PST

If you think America is badly run, come to Australia, but buy a return ticket. You will be pleased to use it!
I have a love/hate relationship with unions. I had to weather rough time with a militant union many yeas ago, and was locked in a freezing cold wharf shed overnight because I worked 5 minutes over my time, and was ready to do battle with the Waterside Workers Union, until I was reminded by my Boss that already, three men had "accidently drowned" in the previous couple of weeks.
But not all unions are like that, and some large corporations are hard, greedy, and willing to use their empoyees as mere tools.
As much as I do not love unons, we would possibly be working under the same conditions as China, without union support.
Governments, like any powerful body, may have the educational expertise, but rarely have the intelligence to match the power they have. They waste a lot to help little. Left wing have all heart and little head. Right wing have great head and little heart.
Yes, Unions have done a lot of damage to our countries, but employees have always accepted the money and improved conditions.
Sadly, greed is something we see in others, but are not aware of it in ourselves. No government has ever made a country great, or clearly solved a world problem.
Big hearts, with common sense could prevail, We could work a little harder and smarter, for a little less, and maybe keep some of or production in our own countries, but would we be prepared to do this? Our Big Business in our countries could reduce the profit margin somewhat, but woud the shareholders be happy?
Incidentally, if you would like to earn about $2,000 per week, with the Aust Dollar at 109 cents against the American dollar, come on over to Australia, to the the greatest coal mine in the world where once some of the best food producing land was once available. Our government is selling Australia to American and other world companies, so they can make moonscapes of rich fertile land, and the landholders can do nothing about it. You can take home, cases of Australian Souveniers, all made in China! Some have tried to compete with better products, but tourists won't buy them.
Be the way, whose buying the coal? CHINA

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America is so much like Australia!
Feb 11, 2012 6:34AM PST

America is so much like Austalia. We have so much to celebrate. (Australia has Austrlian Rules Football and Cricket (which is a kind of gereatric baseball) instead of Super Bowl, to get people in the mood for escape from toil, but the Chinese human workforce have little to celebrate at all.

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Boycott Apple?
Feb 7, 2012 2:49AM PST
No nor any of the other brands. Who we need to boycott are the labor unions here in this country that have driven wages so high for them to get their enormous pay checks have driven these companies to China rather than using the thousands of people here in the USA to build these computers. When the labor unions fail here (starting to in Texas, Indiana and others), I wouldn't doubt they will try and move to China.
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Yes, it's those greedy workers!
Feb 7, 2012 4:12AM PST

Thank you so much for your enlightened and enlightening analysis.
What is the minimum wage you would accept? Would you respond at midnight to a call to work twelve hours with no overtime etc. Would you work under dangerous conditions similar to those found in China? Would you work 12 to 16 hours per day? Seven days a week? No vacations? In a society with no public schools? No public health, clean water etc etc like those in China, India, etc?
So let's get rid of unions and go back to those "good old days" or perhaps Mr. Fitch you might just read up a bit of the history of the workplace and come to your senses.

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What is better greedy workers or no work at all?
Feb 8, 2012 2:40AM PST

While people still have some welfare benefits, then maybe it is better not to work at all, but if the whole western world will continue to ship their jobs to China they might end up starving to death or working 1$ per hour jobs under horrible conditions and will be grateful for having any kind of job. I agree that it is totally unrealistic for unions to demand those enormous paychecks, unless governments prohibit companies to manufacture their products in other countries, but that means you have a socialist country. I'd say - leave Apple alone, but put pressure on China, but no country is powerful enough to demand anything from China.

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yup the good old days
Feb 10, 2012 3:28PM PST

That is correct, we need people to accept these working conditions. Americans have come to expect a lifestyle filled with toys and luxuries. But the only way to have the amount we expect is for everything to be relatively cheap. That means it has to be made cheaply. That means we need a class of low paid, hard working folks who will make it for us. We used to have such people here through the 50's. But as unions gained power they ran up their salaries and soon we lost the poor working class that drove our country through the Industrial Revolution. Now everyone wants the lifestyle of plentiful cheap goods but no-one here will live in poverty while working hard to make them. So manufacturing went overseas.
We simple cannot all live the good life. It is not `fair' but that is capitalism. It is structured to have a few at the top, a number in the middle and a lot at the bottom. The middle-class cannot hold everyone. You can rail against it all you want, but every nation which is an economic powerhouse needs a poor laboring class. That is why China and India will dominate in the next century. We are only still on top due to 70 years of prosperity. But just as England lost the top spot in the world, we will as well. All indicators point to it.

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Greedy workers Yes, Work hard noting to worry about.
Feb 11, 2012 11:26AM PST

This is exactly what unions have spewed for centuries. We are here to represent the workers. Unions are there to skim money off the top for the organizers against companies and care nothing about the companies then enforce policies against. The extract unrealistic promises by the company and fees for the workers. What about going to work everyday and working hard the good ole American way. Now you only have to work reasonable hard for the probationary period six months maybe a year for civil servce and then slack off until you retire and get enormous benifits. No one is suggesting we go back to the dark ages but a little hard work or actually working 8 to ten hours never hurt anyone. If you don't work a company should be able to remove the person and replace with a employee that wants to work. If a company was unfair in the employee treatment now days there would be no employees to hire. Today in America is much more civilized here now unlike is was when unions started. I am under no circumstancessaying tha curent employment laws should be abandoned. There was a time and place for unions but the enormous cost from unions are now hurting American companies and are not allowing them to compete in the world market.

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Yes, and I already do
Feb 7, 2012 2:51AM PST

Apple has not been the wonderful, friendly company that it purports to be. Steve Jobs himself played nasty business tactics when he was alive. Apple has been all about innovation for itself, but has been obstructionist otherwise. I know that others are guilty of the same tactics, but Apple liked to be thought of as the good guys. Good heavens! That company in China--Foxcomm--is a modern version of an antebellum plantation! It's disgusting! Boycott them!

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Outsourced Over-priced Garbage.....
Feb 7, 2012 2:51AM PST

It's amazing how many people are rushing to Crapple's defence, saying that this isn't just a Forbidden Fruit problem. However, other companies, like Samsung [Korea], LG [Korea], HTC [China], Sony [Japan], Nokia [Finland], Ericsson [Sweden; consortium with Sony now] and RIM [Canada, Mexico, Hungary, China], make no bones about their origins. Slapple has always passed its' self off as an American company. And they still do. With their transient Cupertino workforce, where job security comes 2 weeks at a time with no benefits. Buy American means using UPS and FedEx. They can't even be bothered to buy cars from NA auto-makers. They sold Texas Instruments down the road and now Samsung took their chip division over in Texas. More profits heading over-seas! Even when there's an American solution [Corning Gorilla Glass] available, they REFUSE to pay royalties, poach the technology and get the Chinese to come up with an equivalent. All to save a buck! And they have the gall to charge $750 for an inferior handset with a tiny screen and 2007 3G technology! And Jobs had the temerity to attack Google/Android about the open-source platform, which has been under development since 2003.... Unbelievable! Yet, the lemmings still line up to over-spend for under-performing products that look pretty. Which is fine for a toaster, I guess.....

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Lies and Bluster
Feb 7, 2012 5:09PM PST

You should get your facts sorted out before ranting - provide some reference to back up suspicions. From a NY Times article by the same author as the latest hatchet job: "Manufacturing glass for the iPhone revived a Corning factory in
Kentucky, and today, much of the glass in iPhones is still made there." Corning has also built factories in Japan and Taiwan. Apple did not "attack Google/Android about the open-source platform" - they attacked them for lazily, slavishly copying the user interface and entire look and feel... reminiscent of a cheap transistor radio of the 60s. As for your Texas Instruments claim, I have no idea what you're babbling about.

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Blame the Wall street & govt.
Feb 7, 2012 7:03PM PST

The wild, unconstitutional concentration of wealth in very few hands, is to blame. All companies need to follow the money, including Apple. Anti-trust laws were thrown overboard at some point. The WS tycoons care nothing about unemployment, trade balance, debt and such.
Democracy is called for! But Washington is sewn up.

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Unconstitutional?
Feb 10, 2012 10:57PM PST

What are you talking about? The constitution sets no limits on gathering wealth, monopolies or lots of other things. Anti-trust laws did not exist before the early 20th century. Stop quoting `Occupy some out-house' rhetoric and learn your own nation's history.

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Do you think it's fair just to pick on Apple? YES
Feb 7, 2012 2:52AM PST

I used to work for a Silicon Valley hard-drive company. We manufactured in Singapore, and then
we were opening plants in China and Thailand. We had very small profit margins, so one could argue
that we "had to" manufacture in these places to compete. As an American engineer, did I think it was
GOOD that we manufactured in these places? Absolutely not.

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Thank you, pcardout!
Feb 7, 2012 7:55AM PST

Thank you for your experienced voice of reason. Happy

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Would I boycott Apple ... YES
Feb 7, 2012 2:54AM PST

Simply put ... I don't like them, their style of management or their products. Never have !!!

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SHOULD APPLE BE SINGLED OUT? OR IS IT A NATIONAL PROBLUM
Feb 7, 2012 2:54AM PST

AS A NATION WE HAVE TO BE COMPETIVE IN OUR COST OF MANUFACTURING. IF OTHER NATIONS GET THEIR PEOPLE TO WORK CHEAPER WE HAVE TO FIGURE HOW TO DO IT BETTER, FASTER AND MORE COST EFFECTIVE. WE AS A NATION WANT CHEAPER GOODS, CLOTHES, TV'S, COMPUTERS, ALMOST EVERYTHING INCLUDING FOOD. WE MUST AGREE TO PAY HIGHER PRICES FOR AMERICAN MANUFACTURED IDEMS. IT WON'T HAPPEN. DH

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Who says that company is the only one?
Feb 7, 2012 2:55AM PST

Picking on Apple due to the working conditions of that company in China is not fair. How many other companies use companies with poor working conditions? And it seems it is more of a concern for picking on China and Apple. Do you realize how many companies have poor working conditions here in the United States? Or are you just turning a blind eye because its in the US? Yes, we use companies that have poor working conditions, worldwide, and that is truly the American way because it is all based on the all mighty American Dollar. We are picking on Apple because it is a rich company, would you be picking if it was a lowbie company that no one has really heard of? And are you willing to pay at least twice as much for your products you have in your living room, kitchen, and bedroom to improve the working conditions? Sorry, but I work for one of those companies in the US and I can't afford to.

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Apple Boycott
Feb 7, 2012 2:57AM PST

if we would boycott every company overseas for unfair practices we all be walking around nude. no pants, no shirt , no shoes , no socks catching my drift.

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Apple Boycott
Feb 8, 2012 4:14AM PST

And sitting in our empty houses/apartments/huts/caves with just our rocking chair (possibly made in USA, but I'm too old to sit on the floor) and plastic bins made in Ohio. And let's not forget that a lot of our food is imported, as well.

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Do it for you.
Feb 7, 2012 3:01AM PST

Only if it makes you feel better. That is the only motivation. In particular, picking on Apple because their profits are higher just means they are less likely to be affected by your buying decision. As many are pointing out, if you think you are "clean" by not buying Apple you are seriously deluded. Only by going "off the grid" are you going to be disassociated with potentially evil activities, and then you have to prepared to make a lot more sacrifices than merely living without an iPad.

If you wrote a letter to the execs at Apple telling them as a user or potential user of their products you are concerned about their labor practices, it probably still wouldn't affect their behavior, but it would be a lot more likely to. Only focused and well organized boycotts are likely to have an actual effect. The sort of boycott proposed here amounts to little more than windmill tilting.

If you feel, though, that you can't in good conscience do business with Apple based on their labor practices then feel free. You have to make your own personal decisions. I won't do business with, or own stock in, a company like Philip Morris that hawks addictive carcinogens. But that's me.

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We are ALL GUILTY
Feb 7, 2012 3:05AM PST

We are in a financial crunch and each one of us is guilty of looking for the Cheapest Price and Not where it is coming from. Almost all the computer parts and peripherals are made in China. It takes some time and effort to find things made elsewhere and most don't have or take the time. It is basic Supply and Demand. It we didn't create the demand for the Cheaper products the businesses would not build the Supply overseas. What happened to Made in America? We may not be willing to pay more. Unions have not helped by demanding more than is fair.

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WHY ??
Feb 7, 2012 3:05AM PST

Cant for the life of me understand why the working conditions should be so bad when every thing apple is so expensive

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You should understand this:
Feb 7, 2012 1:47PM PST

Apple DOES NOT own or even operate the factories that assemble its products, so there should be absolutely ZERO correlation between the price of their goods and the working conditions of these people. These people choose to go to that factory every day, and they choose to work long hours; no-one has them chained up in there. This is an issue for the PRoC to deal with, not the US, and certainly not Apple.

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Apple Boycott
Feb 7, 2012 3:10AM PST

Apple maintains a vice-like grip on all aspects of it's products. It's inconceivable they aren't aware of the working conditions at the manufacturing facility. It comes down to greed. personally, I think the tax rates should be upped and all subsidies eliminated for American companies who manufacture products outside the U.S.A. Globalization be damned.

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The point is Apple's higher level of hypocracy.
Feb 7, 2012 3:12AM PST

<font size="3" face="Times New Roman">
</font><font size="3"><span style="'font-family:" "Arial","sans-serif";'>Apple has
always branded itself as the cool, future oriented, anti-establishment company.
For this nonsense, they demand a higher price. We have always known that Dell
and HP are cutthroat organizations with low ethical levels. We need to raise
the awareness of Apple's hypocrisy to level the playing field and hopefully the
prices. Greed is greed. All these companies need to clean up their act. The
first one to do so will receive my loyalty.<?xml:namespace prefix =" o" ns =" "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office"" /><oSilly></oSilly></font>
<font size="3" face="Times New Roman">
</font>

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Boycot any thing made in China
Feb 7, 2012 3:16AM PST

Any thing I find made in china I avoid, Be it toys, Computers, food, tools I look at the sque codes and if it is china made I wont buy it.

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Really? Guess again!
Feb 7, 2012 2:07PM PST

I highly doubt you don't buy anything from China. Trust me, your home is FULL of Chinese-made items. Just because something is manufactured in the US doesn't mean it's void of foreign material and/or partial assembly. Take Cummins Deisel engines for example. I bet you would feel real good about buying that American-made engine, huh? Guess what, I used to work in the factory that manufactured the Cummins B-Series engine for Dodge Ram pickup, and although it's assembled in the US, almost every single part of the engine is of foreign origin. The block and head are both cast in Brazil, the push tubes and rocker levers come from Thailand, the ECM and sensors are from (you guessed it) CHINA, the wiring harnesses are all from Japan. Not only this, but the nice 'American' trucks these engines go into are mostly manufactured in Mexico. You have to do some very long, hard research to avoid buying anything from China, and most likely you won't avoid foreign products altogether. I would even wager that your home was built with foreign materials, right down to the nails holding it together.

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Made in China
Feb 7, 2012 10:51PM PST

Eladsit:
Your computer insides are made in china. Some of your food is made in china or mexico. The insides of your car are made in china or someother country. Same thing if you paid for public transportation. The buses, trains etc parts are made in china. Parts of your house and your regular american appliances insides are made in china. Frankly i wont be surprised if our medications are made in china(if not now im sure it will be in the future).

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Do you think it's fair just to pick on Apple?
Feb 7, 2012 3:16AM PST

I think this is the wrong question. The right question would be something like, "Do you think boycotting one company for doing what virtually every American company is doing would serve any useful purpose?" My answer to this would be, "Obviously not."