While Apple may have been hoping for some leniency from the US government on the impact of new US Tariffs, there are rumblings of just the opposite. Recently, Trump tweeted his acknowledgement that product prices might go up, but his solution for the price hikes isn’t exactly what Apple and other manufacturers want to hear. Trump says the easy solution is to make the products in the US. “Start building new plants now,” Trump said.
Apple has claimed that the Apple Watch, HomePod, Mac mini and accessories would be more expensive in the US as a result of imposing new tariffs on China.
The issue is that it’s not as simple as building new plants in the US. It’s not just the cost of the workers, it’s the flexibility of that worker pool and access to resources. If Apple needs to step up production due to demand, factory partners like Foxconn can recruit thousands of properly qualified workers within weeks. And while there are US suppliers, many of Apple’s component producers are located in China and would have to ship parts overseas.
Apple still promises that they are invested in the US, but theycan’t build everything in the country without major sacrifices.
