Apple has given Donald Trump something he can trumpet as a personal success. And something he can presumably no longer constantly criticize Apple for anymore.
Apple is acting all patriotic. CEO Tim Cook has said the firm’s success story couldn’t have been written anywhere except America. The company is now dutifully promising to contribute to the American economy. This supposedly involves paying $38 billion in tax and creating 20,000 jobs. That’s quite something, you could say.
In truth, Apple is not making any kind of sacrifice. The payment to the taxman was prompted by the tax reform bill in America, and it’s now due because the company has amassed so much money abroad thanks to clever tax-saving schemes. Apple can take the pain because the burden would have been much higher under the old tax system.
The majority of the envisaged jobs and investment, in turn, would probably have come about without the tax reform anyway. The company will benefit enormously from the tax reform; in this light, their words are not particularly impressive.
But it does give Donald Trump something he can trumpet as a personal success — and Apple presumably won’t have to face being criticized by him for producing most of its products in China, not America.
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