I cite: Apple, Accustomed to Profits and Praise, Faces Outcry for Labor Practices at Chinese Factories

February 10, 2012

Apple, Accustomed to Profits and Praise, Faces Outcry for Labor Practices at Chinese Factories

CHARLES DUHIGG: Actually, we started a series on focusing on Apple as a lens by which to look at how temporary economics, and particularly American economics, are working now about a year ago. And an important part of that, as we were talking to people who worked with Apple, was the reason why Apple can manufacture these amazing devices now, that appear almost as quickly as their dreamed up, is because manufacturing has been located in—relocated in Asia. And the scale and capacity of manufacturing there is amazing. You can send over plans for an idea and, literally, within weeks have that idea become real.

AMY GOODMAN: You begin one of your pieces by President Obama meeting with Steve Jobs in a group of people. And talk about what Obama asked Jobs.

CHARLES DUHIGG: Well, one of the things that President Obama asked was, is it ever possible to bring back those jobs to the United States, to make iPhones in the U.S.? And what Steve Jobs said was—I think accurately—those jobs are never coming back. And the reason why isn’t just because workers are cheaper in China, although that—they are cheaper in China; it’s because China has established a huge competitive advantage over the U.S. There are supply chains that exist in China and Asia now which the U.S. simply can’t replicate. And there’s a system of labor there that allows factories to hire 3,000 people overnight or, as Mike can speak to, create facilities that house 250,000 workers and change them in a couple of hours or a couple of days from one product to another. It’s an amazing, amazing manufacturing capacity that’s grown up overseas—with harsh costs associated with it, but that makes it possible for us to get a brand new iPhone every single year.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, and I wanted to ask you about that capacity, because we hear a lot about the post-industrial society, but in reality, when you’re talking about these plants that have 100,000 workers, they dwarf anything that the old classic River Rouge plant of Henry Ford had created.

CHARLES DUHIGG: That’s exactly right. America lives—might live in a post-industrial society, but we do so because other countries are entering their industrial society, and they’re entering it at a scale, at a speed, at a perfection of production, that was completely undreamed of in the United States in the past. And I’m sure many of your audience, many people, they carry an iPhone in your pocket. It’s a wonderful device. It’s an amazing device. And it exists only really because there is this nation that can produce it so quickly and so efficiently.