Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

macrumors.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 115 posts

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#71

Post by teh_klev »

maskedinvader wrote: post #51
esterly wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. Friends use an up vote for this parent.

why is this downvoted ? I didn't read this as an endorsement to upvote but rather as witty response to @argonaut , unless i'm missing something else entirely here and the downvotes are warranted.

See:

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

"Please resist commenting about being downvoted. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading."

Rallying the crowd for up-votes (even for another user's post) falls pretty much in the same ballpark.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#72

Post by eru »

ep103 wrote: post #68
baddox wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While america was in its infancy - before it industrialized - it too used protectionism as a way to allow its local industries to grow, how is it bad if India is trying to do the same thing ? I was under the impression that anti-protectionism was one of the least controversial positions among economics. Obviously it can help the specific local industries that are being protected from competition, but it seems almos…

Most important piece of the following post? http://www.zompist.com/jacobs.html I'm not an economist, but I've gotten the impression from reading lots of articles like this, that it is net negative overall, as in, world wide. But I have never, ever seen a source claim that it is net negative on a national or local level outside of very, very narrowly defined parameters. I have, however, read academic papers that state…

> But I have never, ever seen a source claim that it is net negative on a national or local level outside of very, very narrowly defined parameters.

Adam Smith already (and lots of other economists since) have argued for unilateral free trade.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#73

Post by danans »

dxbydt wrote: post #60
notahacker wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

India has jobs for everyone at every level if you consider "temple beggar" to be a job and wizened old women in their sixties to be appropriate people to be doing road maintenance. $200 dollars per month sounds like an unusually generous salary for unskilled labour there too - engineering degree or no engineering degree. Of course, it also has plenty of opportunities for a growing middle class that didn't exist for t…

Yeah, I'm not so sure. On the one hand, there's stuff like this - https://twitter.com/pankaj/status/729417379730448384 Here you have SF entrepreneurs with vastly more capital & information than the average person in the US buying one way tickets to India. Just last week, I had coffee with a YC founder who mentioned casually that "YC16 has dozens of startups out of Bangalore". He had conducted mock interviews for the…

>At the same time you talk of "temple beggar jobs and 60 year old women doing road maintenance". > Am honestly unable to reconcile these opposing narratives.

India is a massive complex country, just like the US. It has plenty of physical and cultural space to accommodate both those narratives. You might consider visiting there to see both play out at the same time for yourself - it's fascinating.

But you don't need to look as far as SF to India to find such opposing narratives. SF entrepreneurs with vast amounts of capital are in close proximity to many people right in the Bay Area working for low wages in marginal and informal jobs (day laborers, child-care workers, domestic maids), and even people in jobs that involve human oppression (human trafficking, etc).

EDIT: comment added.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#74

Post by walrus01 »

wrong_variable wrote: post #13

Before people get out their pitchforks. These laws in India are a direct result of 200 years of British 'free' trade. Imagine the amount of damage something like NAFTA has done to the american working class - multiply that with 200 years. While america was in its infancy - before it industrialized - it too used protectionism as a way to allow its local industries to grow, how is it bad if India is trying to do the sa…

India's extremely complicated bureaucratic nightmare of inter-state borders and customs/tariffs is the fault of the British?

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/31/india-economic-...

Imagine if you had cargo truck borders and customs paperwork between every one of the US 50 states and what a nightmare it would be for trucking/logistics/distribution/warehousing/cold chain/etc.

Indian states have a significant degree of regulatory autonomy, far beyond what a US state or a Canadian province has, to the extend that some states are looking at banning alcohol entirely and others have unique tax code and criminal code laws not found in the rest of India.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#75

Post by baddox »

nicoburns wrote: post #65
baddox wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While america was in its infancy - before it industrialized - it too used protectionism as a way to allow its local industries to grow, how is it bad if India is trying to do the same thing ? I was under the impression that anti-protectionism was one of the least controversial positions among economics. Obviously it can help the specific local industries that are being protected from competition, but it seems almos…

> I was under the impression that anti-protectionism was one of the least controversial positions among economics. It is, but I think this says more about the sorry state of economics than it does about whether protectionism is ever a good idea.

Why do you say that? Again, I'm not an economist, but opposing protectionism makes sense to me intuitively.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#76

Post by bduerst »

baddox wrote: post #32
arey_abhishek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll add that America is the most protectionist country according to Credit Suisse: http://www.businessinsider.in/The-country-that-imposes-the-m... (Couldn't find link to original report) Worked out well for America. Protectionist laws are a legitimate tool for social and economic progress.

What is the evidence that Americans wouldn't be better off if there were less protectionism?

Protectionism shrinks markets, drives up prices, and reduces consumer choice. The decreased competition from protectionism also decreases technological development.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#77

Post by eru »

rahulsidhu wrote: post #61
shas3 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know people who work as "fixers" specializing in navigating such government restrictions and bureaucracy for local and foreign companies in India. It is more likely that the real reason for Apple's rejection is the whim of some high level bureaucrat ("IAS officer"). It may not even be corruption, even righteous bureaucrats are often stupid. The amount of red-tape in India is astounding.

On the contrary, my guess would be that this decision was taken at the highest political levels, and I applaud this decision. I read that the govt. set up a small committee of bureaucrats which recommended a waiver and I was hoping for this outcome. This would hopefully incentivise Apple to move at-least some of their assembly to Foxconn India. We need all the jobs and economic activity we can get.

I don't know, forced Import Substitution Industrialization (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Import_substitution_industrial...) hasn't worked very well around the world so far.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#78

Post by wrong_variable »

walrus01 wrote: post #74
wrong_variable wrote: post #13

Before people get out their pitchforks. These laws in India are a direct result of 200 years of British 'free' trade. Imagine the amount of damage something like NAFTA has done to the american working class - multiply that with 200 years. While america was in its infancy - before it industrialized - it too used protectionism as a way to allow its local industries to grow, how is it bad if India is trying to do the sa…

India's extremely complicated bureaucratic nightmare of inter-state borders and customs/tariffs is the fault of the British? http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/31/india-economic-... Imagine if you had cargo truck borders and customs paperwork between every one of the US 50 states and what a nightmare it would be for trucking/logistics/distribution/warehousing/cold chain/etc. Indian states have a significant de…

The post has nothing to do with inter-state commerce. Its to do with Federal Laws set by the Indian Govt, which overall seems to be deeply protectionist. If you ask any historian the reasoning for this attitude in India and why its tolerated - is mainly because of the holdover from the time India was colonized by European Powers.

Essentially what I am saying is that its not easy to sell 'Free Trade' in India.

I wasn't blaming anyone for anything - just staying the facts. I personally think it would help India to loosen up some of its protectionist laws and be a little bit more like China - but that is just my own opinion.

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#79

Post by ep103 »

eru wrote: post #72
ep103 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most important piece of the following post? http://www.zompist.com/jacobs.html I'm not an economist, but I've gotten the impression from reading lots of articles like this, that it is net negative overall, as in, world wide. But I have never, ever seen a source claim that it is net negative on a national or local level outside of very, very narrowly defined parameters. I have, however, read academic papers that state…

> But I have never, ever seen a source claim that it is net negative on a national or local level outside of very, very narrowly defined parameters. Adam Smith already (and lots of other economists since) have argued for unilateral free trade.

That's in keeping with my post

Re: Apple Not Able to Open Stores in India Without Selling 30% Locally Sourced Goods

#80

Post by eru »

rahulsidhu wrote: post #64

Seeing a lot of neo-liberal economics dogma here in the comments, and so would like to recommend this excellent book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Asia-Works-Success-Failure/dp/1... . It has an excellent account of how manufacturing (supported by heavy protectionism from the state) was a crucial component of the Asian miracle in nearly all countries. IMO India really needs to go through a round of manufacturing expan…

You mean paleo-liberal economics dogma? Just about all mainstream economists ever agree on free trade.

(Though in this case, they are just banning Apple Stores, apparently, not Apple products. So it doesn't really matter too much.)

Post reply on HN