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Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

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Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#231

Post by Retric »

elefanten wrote: post #181
Retric wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China has the 2nd largest military budget but only spends 1.7% GDP on it vs the global average of 2.2% and US at 3.5%. India the worlds 3rd largest spender is between them at 2.7% GDP, and #4 the UK spends 2.2% GDP. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_... I may strongly dislike China, but a relative lack of military spending is one of their strengths.

Trend rapidly changing, they were focused elsewhere previously. The part that matters is what they’ll use it for (so far, signs point to authoritarian conquest of sovereign political entities)

As a share of GDP it was higher in 2019 at 1.9%, so it's growth it really a function of economic growth.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#232

Post by sour-taste »

wongarsu wrote: post #138
MichaelBurge wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's market cap is $2.7 trillion. How hard could it be for them to get a few nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and tell China, "We refuse to comply with your labeling requirements. Just try to stop us"?

Apple has about $40 billion cash on hand. A nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is about $10 billion, plus another 6 billion for the aircraft (taking a Nimitz class with 90 Super Hornets). Add in ammunition, crew, training, support craft, operational expenses. Buying more than one would seriously strain Apple's budget. And all of that to expose it to China's anti-ship missiles and dare them to shoot. Seems like a terrib…

Not to mention that I'm pretty sure the USA doesn't want it's private companies running their own Navies and going toe to toe with foreign forces

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#233

Post by sam36 »

TheMagicHorsey wrote: post #144

It will be painful. It will cause huge economic disruption. There will be a fall in living standards and severe inflation. But, it's time for US companies to pull out of China. The moral imperative to help China rise out of poverty through trade is done. They are no longer a poor country. Now we are compromising our values for something stupid ... for cheaper iPhones. Long term our Grandchildren will all be under the…

I've thought this for the last 10+ years or so. I even tried to not buy anything that was "made in china" for many years. I'm so amazed that people were fine with the recent higher gas prices because it would be helping the war in Ukraine. But yet no one wants to end trade with china because it would rise the costs of goods. Just 40 years ago there was literally nothing coming from china. They flood our markets with cheap crap that is made by burning coal, nobody cares that the end product breaks in mere days or weeks because you can just "buy another one". They've ruined the entire aftermarket parts industry for cars as almost every replacement part you buy at autozone is a chinese knockoff that will leave you stranded on the side of the road (my family runs an auto shop, the parts reliability issues are insane while autozone stock goes to the moon).

And then the main issue is all this cheapness is possible because workers are paid pennies a day and take meth so they can work 15 hour days doing tedious hand assembly because the person labor is cheaper than using a machine to automate. And now our media is flooded with news bites about how oppressive and racist america is while china gets away with literal slavery and everyone there believes all non-chinese are inferior.

Screw these people and their government.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#234

Post by 99_00 »

BudaDude wrote: post #33

This should honestly be picked up by a larger news organization. If the US is serious about protecting Taiwan and bringing more chips to the US, Apple should be shamed for choosing Chinese profits. Imagine if Apple told Ukraine employees to label Russia on their badges.

>If the US is serious about protecting Taiwan

US isn't even serious about protecting themselves.

"Given the aggression we are seeing...and the FBI director...saying that China...is the #1 threat to the U.S. in the next 10 yrs, would [Biden]...caution companies from expanding...in China?"

"private companies...make their own decisions" - John Kirby, National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications

https://twitter.com/CurtisHouck/status/1555282788210860034

But the administration has no problem telling business what to do when it cares about the issue, for example telling gas stations to lower prices.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#235

Post by kipchak »

gedy wrote: post #40
melling wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“America’s future is at stake” Please. It’s 2022 and the China buildup was funded by the American consumer over the past 3 decades. It’s already too late but it’s easy to criticize companies that gave us they cheaper products we so desired by offshoring

> gave us they cheaper products we so desired by offshoring This is kind of silly to blame average people on the street for buying something cheaper that shows up in their local stores. This is all on the government (both parties), and large corporations for pushing this. People didn't "want" NAFTA, slave labor, etc.

I think it's only reasonable to place blame on the population if you figure elected officials are representative of their constituents, and that the population has a responsibility to make sure it stays that way. Simultaneously you could make a pretty good case going the other way, or that we're well past that point.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#236

Post by seabrookmx »

bigcat12345678 wrote: post #190
BudaDude wrote: post #33

This should honestly be picked up by a larger news organization. If the US is serious about protecting Taiwan and bringing more chips to the US, Apple should be shamed for choosing Chinese profits. Imagine if Apple told Ukraine employees to label Russia on their badges.

You should educate yourself about the fact that PRC Taiwan and USA all legally recognize one China policy. China is not PRC, PRC is at best the only internationally recognized government of China. Even so there is still only one China. Of cuz, because of US are exceptional, US does not abide by the international law, so Pelosi visited Taiwan as a high level official from US. Apple need to operate in the boundary of l…

The USA has imperfect history for sure. But that doesn't change the fact that currently, none of those things you mention are actively happening.. whereas the critiques of the PRC are based on current events like the Uyghur genocide and removal of freedoms in Hong Kong. A nation is molded by it's history not identified by it. Nobody fears the Nazis when visiting Berlin today.

> the fact that PRC Taiwan and USA all legally recognize one China policy

Notice how you use the term "legally." You know that in fact, most nations around the world treat Taiwan as a de-facto independent nation. The USA's formal word on this is as follows: "acknowledges that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China"

Notice how it does _not_ claim that the _USA_ thinks there is only one China. Only that it recognizes PRC and Taiwan do.

> Apple need to operate in the boundary of law

Apple need operate in the boundary of PRC law if they want to keep their Chinese factories, workers and profits, and that's what this critique is all about. Nobody else cares if they have "made in Taiwan" on their parts or products. In fact, I'd prefer if they did as it's more transparent!

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#237

Post by Torifyme12 »

quantumwannabe wrote: post #219
hodgesrm wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple has spent many years happily profiting from cheap Chinese manufacturing, labor, electrial engineering expertise and supply chains to the point where they are now completely beholden to a foreign country. Up to a point there's a cost advantage, but Tim Cook has also pointed that Apple uses Chinese factories because it allows them to take advantage of the local manufacturing capabilities, which are substantial.…

Tim Cook also invested a third of a trillion dollars in China because they did not have the manufacturing capabilities to build the iPhone how Apple wanted at the time of the investment. [1] [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-tim-cook-275-billion-c...

And Cook mocked the US because we didn't have the right tooling to make screws for his Mac pro, he went all over the news and kept spewing how bad our industrial sector was.

One of the tooling engineers that had previously worked with Apple before they were offshored said, "Well, we couldn't wait around for him to come back to us, we have to eat too so we switched to making different things. He's welcome to invest in our production and we'll make whatever he wants"

Cook loves helping out China, not sure why. /s

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#238

Post by jmyeet »

This is unsurprising. The reality is that the US, China and even much of Taiwan actually or effectively supports the One CHina policy.

It would be suicide for China to invade Taiwan. The economic damage this would do to China is immense. China may well collapse. Aside from that, it's not that easy either. China may well have a much larger military but a sea crossing is no easy feat.

Look at Britain. It hasn't been successfully invaded by sea in almost 1000 years (1066 being th elast time). On a clear day you can see the white cliffs of Dover from Calais (~17 miles across the English Channel) yet the might of Nazi Germany could never cross it.

Even though the US has legislation to protect Taiwan, if push came to shove, the US simply wouldn't trigger a direct war between nuclear powers in the sam eway that the US isn't getting directly involved in Ukraine.

And much of Taiwan is happy with the situation as is. Pushing independence is going to seriously rock the boat.

So everyone is happy with the situation of China having an official policy that Taiwan is part of China without anything actually changing including China.

I'm personally not a fan of Western companies being influenced by the CCP dangling the carrot of access to the Chinese market when it's a mirage. China will never allow a Western company to dominate the Chinese market. Yet we have Hollywood, for example, kowtowing to China.

China really took an L (IMHO) over the Pelosi visit. She's not the first House Speaker to visit (Newt Ginrich being the last ~25 years ago). By taking a public position, China really gave the US no choice but to proceed rather than back down. It's just mishandled all the way.

So we'll have symbolic things like "Made in --Taiwan--China" as retaliation.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#239

Post by dragonwriter »

Retric wrote: post #160
cronix wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they've been taking the profits and building their military at a fast rate for 20 years...to do...something.

China has the 2nd largest military budget but only spends 1.7% GDP on it vs the global average of 2.2% and US at 3.5%. India the worlds 3rd largest spender is between them at 2.7% GDP, and #4 the UK spends 2.2% GDP. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_... I may strongly dislike China, but a relative lack of military spending is one of their strengths.

> China has the 2nd largest military budget but only spends 1.7% GDP on it

Not really sure that comparisons of either GDP or state spending on a purpose as a share of it (even if GDP were comparable) are as meaningful as people pretend across regimes with vastly different degrees of state/industry integration both generally (because of effect on GDP measures) or in the field of interest (because of effects on spending measures.)

Unfortunately, there's not good alternative measures, either.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#240

Post by 99_00 »

INTPenis wrote: post #86
BudaDude wrote: post #33

This should honestly be picked up by a larger news organization. If the US is serious about protecting Taiwan and bringing more chips to the US, Apple should be shamed for choosing Chinese profits. Imagine if Apple told Ukraine employees to label Russia on their badges.

It amazes me how quickly people online are willing to start ww3. It seems like it's not the world leaders we have to worry about, it's the fucking commenters. Yes it should be picked up but the US can't just go in swinging with China. Nobody wins.

“Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.” The Art of War, Sun Tzu

It amazes me how many people assume China has a strong military without doing the most basic research.

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