[tablespoon]

> Maybe, maybe not? We’ll see if this goes well as planed. Easier said than done.

My understanding is that China's manufacturing supply chain is so well-developed that companies like Apple don't think they even have a choice except build their stuff there. The only things they're missing are a few things at the very high end. If they lack a commitment to free markets, its conceivable that they could use that advantage to slowly strangle their global competitors (e.g. allow their domestic champions a price/quality/volume advantages, while keeping the value proposition for global companies just good enough that continued dependence makes economic sense). To counter that, the US would also have to take bold steps away from free market dogma, against the interests if its corporate sector, which has relatively more political power, and against its reigning ideologies [1].

> The point is, companies are already doing this. You’ll be surprised how much conglomerates like Samsung has already taken production out of China.

I'd be interested to know how truly disentangled they are. My understanding is that even when companies move production away from China, they're still seriously dependent on China's manufacturing supply chain (e.g. they have to ship all the components from China to Vietnam for final assembly). I'm not aware of any efforts to replicate the range of capabilities elsewhere.

[1] The right would have issues with stepping away from free market economics, and I think the left would be skeptical of the international competition aspect.

[vondur]

Funny thing I noticed that the last batch of iMac's I purchased were made in Thailand.

[tablespoon]

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/17/technology/apple-china-ce...:

> Two decades ago, as Apple’s operations chief, Mr. Cook spearheaded the company’s entrance into China, a move that helped make Apple the most valuable company in the world and made him the heir apparent to Steve Jobs. Apple now assembles nearly all of its products and earns a fifth of its revenue in the China region. But just as Mr. Cook figured out how to make China work for Apple, China is making Apple work for the Chinese government....

> No Plan B

> In 2014, Apple hired Doug Guthrie, the departing dean of the George Washington University business school, to help the company navigate China, a country he had spent decades studying.

> One of his first research projects was Apple’s Chinese supply chain, which involved millions of workers, thousands of plants and hundreds of suppliers. The Chinese government made that operation possible by spending billions of dollars to pave roads, recruit workers, and construct factories, power plants and employee housing.

> Mr. Guthrie concluded that no other country could offer the scale, skills, infrastructure and government assistance that Apple required. Chinese workers assemble nearly every iPhone, iPad and Mac. Apple brings in $55 billion a year from the region, far more than any other American company makes in China.

> “This business model only really fits and works in China,” Mr. Guthrie said in an interview. “But then you’re married to China.”