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Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

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Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#381

Post by msabalau »

chrsw wrote: post #368
adamgordonbell wrote: post #84

Apple is very tied to Chinese manufacturing in a way that is hard to replicate in US. They will agree to make some high margin simple to assemble thing in the US to appease government, but if it goes as well as last time, they will stop as soon as they can. In china they were often able to iterate on designs and have custom screws and other parts made and ramped up in very short times. Something about having the whol…

Well put. I tried to explain this to someone years ago after they asked a question like "why don't they just build a factory here?". I was like "you need more than _a_ factory, you need a whole ecosystem of manufacturing". I guess I didn't make my argument clear enough based on their response. I think the USA has been very clear based on our actions over the past 4 or so decades: we don't want this kind of labor in t…

It is really unclear why you think that either the political interest or strategic logic of not wanting to rely on manufacturing in China, and having some on the value being created here goes away, or is some idle whim.

Sure, if it took decades of slow patient effort to create the current situation, it might take decades to unwind it. And, sure, the US political system is exceptionally bad at industrial policy.

But, at the end of the day, the political and military logic is, and will be for the forseeable future, get your supply chains out of China. Just because it is slow and difficult doesn't there is any reason to believe the pressure will relax. (Putting aside the possibility of an AGI/robotics revolution)

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#382

Post by shiroiuma »

bsder wrote: post #254
dangus wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get fatigue when everyone claims that all these Chinese businesses are state sponsored. Do we not recognize that western governments do this too? Do we not recognize that western banks and VC firms are quasi-state institutions? Do we not see western countries continually subsidize businesses by lowering corporate tax rates and giving out cheap loans? The US government was giving out $7500 per car to buy EVs and the…

> It’s like the western zeitgeist can’t accept that China is simply out-competing them on pure merit. With a 400m head start in a 1600m race. It's a whole lot easier to out-compete somebody when you know the government will backstop you even if you misstep. Solar and battery technology were two of those areas. China absolutely dumped cheap, mostly inferior solar cells on everybody else to wipe out competing manufactu…

>It's a whole lot easier to out-compete somebody when you know the government will backstop you even if you misstep.

You mean like how the US government constantly bails out and props up the American car companies?

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#383

Post by mschuster91 »

ryandrake wrote: post #243
adamgordonbell wrote: post #84

Apple is very tied to Chinese manufacturing in a way that is hard to replicate in US. They will agree to make some high margin simple to assemble thing in the US to appease government, but if it goes as well as last time, they will stop as soon as they can. In china they were often able to iterate on designs and have custom screws and other parts made and ramped up in very short times. Something about having the whol…

> Something about having the whole supply chain in one place I can't find the source but I thought I read somewhere that the major manufacturing cities in China are all geographically laid out like giant assembly lines. The companies that process the raw materials are located mostly inland, then the companies that form those raw materials into metal and plastic stock are next door, and then the companies that take th…

> I can't find the source but I thought I read somewhere that the major manufacturing cities in China are all geographically laid out like giant assembly lines.

... like Factorio, just in real life.

> The US can't even zone a residential neighborhood without lawyers and special interests jamming things up for decades through endless impact studies and litigation.

A lot of that is to prevent our cities from looking like China did before they haphazardly cleaned up shop before the Olympic Games. Remember all the smog alerts? Athletes being afraid the smog and pollution would impact their performance?

> How is it going to compete with a country that can lay out entire cities, organizing the value chain geographically towards the ocean?

There's a tool for that, it's called tariffs - basically, make it uncompetitive for manufacturing moving off to a country that systematically undercuts pricing even at the cost of its environment.

Unfortunately, the current administration doesn't even have the concepts of a plan on what they want to achieve with tariffs. It's mind boggling to watch.

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#384

Post by mhandley »

flumpcakes wrote: post #100

The woman in the pink smock-like clothing: In the video there are Chinese characters on the clothing above the front pocket area. In a picture of her later on in the news article the Chinese writing is gone. Has it been photoshopped out for the press release images?

I don't see her later on in the news article - just in the video. Did Apple remove the picture after you pointed it out?

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#385

Post by jfengel »

lkbm wrote: post #289
mlsu wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you met an engineer? I'd say "being an engineer" is probably the single most predictive trait for authoritarianism in my experience.

Possibly, but it's just as much a predictive trait of being libertarian, which for all its faults, is extremely anti-authoritarian.

When libertarian means liberty for everyone, it's anti-authoritarian.

Too often libertarian means liberty for me and not for you. That's authoritarian.

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#386

Post by [deleted] »

Avicebron wrote: post #272
SaltyBackendGuy wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of a great freakonomics podcast that talked about China being run by engineers and America being run by lawyers. https://freakonomics.com/podcast/china-is-run-by-engineers-a...

Authoritarian central planning isn't an inherent trait of engineers and nor should we aspire for it to be.

[deleted]

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#387

Post by _bent »

Avicebron wrote: post #272
SaltyBackendGuy wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of a great freakonomics podcast that talked about China being run by engineers and America being run by lawyers. https://freakonomics.com/podcast/china-is-run-by-engineers-a...

Authoritarian central planning isn't an inherent trait of engineers and nor should we aspire for it to be.

Every single privately run company is authoritarian.

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#388

Post by selimthegrim »

ryandrake wrote: post #243
adamgordonbell wrote: post #84

Apple is very tied to Chinese manufacturing in a way that is hard to replicate in US. They will agree to make some high margin simple to assemble thing in the US to appease government, but if it goes as well as last time, they will stop as soon as they can. In china they were often able to iterate on designs and have custom screws and other parts made and ramped up in very short times. Something about having the whol…

> Something about having the whole supply chain in one place I can't find the source but I thought I read somewhere that the major manufacturing cities in China are all geographically laid out like giant assembly lines. The companies that process the raw materials are located mostly inland, then the companies that form those raw materials into metal and plastic stock are next door, and then the companies that take th…

You know, I think the bigger issue is Tillman Fertitta scuttling the other UT research campus they wanted to set up in Houston because it would screw up his status as chairman of the University of Houston board or something. I guess Houston’s gonna have to make do with these tech jobs.

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#389

Post by selimthegrim »

montagg wrote: post #344
827a wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your learned helplessness is defeatist and boring. We need not be Moloch's subjects; Apple's business priorities are not the result of some natural and unstoppable force, and their leadership is not exempt from responsibility because of your belief that it is. Someone, sometime, in a surprisingly boring room, wearing a surprisingly boring suit, made decisions like those which opened a factory in China instead of Texa…

Texas would need to train its people. And the people would need to be as hungry as the Chinese were, and are to a certain extent. You should read the book the OT is talking about, it shows how the U.S. didn’t stand a chance in manufacturing, even going back to the 80s. Literally just not getting back to potential clients for two weeks and saying X or Y can’t be done, while Southeast Asian companies were jumping at th…

See my comment up thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47146484) about Tillman Fertitta.

Re: Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston

#390

Post by viraptor »

hamandcheese wrote: post #355
superxpro12 wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For all the progress, you lose me immediately with the "social credit" system. If there was really true 'progress', then you wouldn't need a one-party system that suppresses all dissent. Only need to look to the recent changes in Hong-Kong and the obviously hostile takeover of a democratic government to see how "pure" these changes really are.

> If there was really true 'progress', then you wouldn't need a one-party system that suppresses all dissent. This makes no sense. It is possible for a totalitarian government which is threatened by dissent and concepts like "democracy" to also work in the interest of improving overall quality of life.

If things work so well that everyone's quality or life is improved, why would there be dissent large enough to worry about.

It's the same category as: Why would a company with happy well paid workers be worried about unions and try to stop them forming.

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