US President Donald Trump calls out for Apple in his latest Twitter post on Saturday, telling the giant tech firm that it should opt to produce its gizmos inside the United States if it really wants to avoid tariffs slapped on Chinese imports which in turn, could affect the pricing of its products.
The iPhone maker has said earlier that much of their product lines including the Apple Watch, HomePod, and the Mac Mini, just to mention a few, would bear expensive price tags as soon as they hit the store shelves in the United States as a direct result of the new tariffs placed on Chinese goods, the report from Reuters said.
In his social media account, the US head of state said that Apple products would certainly become more expensive because of the massive tariffs the government is imposing on China.
Trump, however, offered what is considered a solution to Apple's dilemma which could bring down the tax figure to zero, as the president's tweet indicated. Even more so, the POTUS promised tax incentives to the Cupertino-based tech giant if it decides to make its products within the country instead of outsourcing the manufacturing process to the Asian powerhouse.
Trump ended his Twitter post with a call for action, a prompt for the trillion-dollar fruit company to begin building new plants immediately.
In a statement given to the press while aboard the Air Force One, and as cited over at Politico, Trump said that his administration now has plans to impose tariffs on the additional USD$267 billion worth of Chinese goods coming to the country. This would be on top of the existing levies imposed on an earlier bulk of Chinese imports amounting to USD$50 billion. Moreover, Trump also mentioned another set of tariffs on USD$200 billion of import goods.
All in all, there would be a total of USD$517 billion in Chinese goods which will be affected by Trump's tariff threats. Obviously, a wide range of products, from industrial to home use, will be put in the line of fire should the American president decides to make true of both threats.
The Problem With Trump's Solution
Trump's offer of a solution to Apple doesn't sound that easy at all. According to Engadget, building the new plants in the US won't be a wise move for the smartphone maker. For one, the cost to run a workforce in the US is more expensive when compared to Asian nations.
Furthermore, Apple would still have to sell a lot of financial resources to ship the majority of the components which are being produced overseas.
There would certainly be a lot of sacrifices that Apple has to make should it decide to take heed of Trump's business advice.
