{"id":133933,"date":"2018-09-19T08:30:46","date_gmt":"2018-09-19T12:30:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.countingpips.com\/?p=133933"},"modified":"2018-09-18T10:12:04","modified_gmt":"2018-09-18T14:12:04","slug":"the-apple-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/2018\/09\/the-apple-story\/","title":{"rendered":"The Apple Story"},"content":{"rendered":"
September 19, 2018<\/div>
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Trump tariffs penalize US multinationals as US taxation fail<\/i><\/b><\/em><\/strong>s Americans<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

By Dan Steinbock<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

Trump tariffs are based on flawed pre-global doctrines, which penalize US multinationals, as evidenced by Apple. It is not China that fails Americans, but US taxation, as evidenced by Apple. <\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

In the pre-1914 era and during the protectionist interwar period, global economic integration declined drastically. As major corporations competed largely in home markets, their value activities were mainly domestic. Following World War II, the US-led Bretton Woods system ensured a greater degree of internationalization \u2013 including systemic US trade deficits since 1971, decades before deficits with China.<\/p>\n

Thereafter in the \u201880s, US multinationals began to cut costs through offshoring as large chunks of productive capacity were transferred to emerging markets, especially in Asia. So today the \u201ceco-systems\u201d of US multinationals are increasingly global.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s Trump\u2019s dilemma in a nutshell: While tariffs and tariff wars were typical to the era of domestic competition a century ago, they do not work in a more global era. Even \u201cmade in China\u201d products feature diverse value-added inputs by multinational companies producing in, exporting from and selling in China.<\/p>

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In a recent tweet, Trump urged Apple to manufacture in the US, not China. It\u2019s a bad advice. As prices would soar, Apple\u2019s profitability would plunge since it makes 60%-70% of its revenues abroad. If the company would comply, its manufacturing price would soar because of higher labor costs, and loss of advanced manufacturing, logistics and infrastructure in China.<\/p>\n

The iPhone is not a marginal example. It alone accounts for an estimated $16 billion of the U.S. trade deficit with China.<\/p>\n

\u201cMade in China\u201d does not capture value-added<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

Since iPhone alone accounts for some $16 billion of the U.S. trade deficit with China, let\u2019s use it as an example. According to data, the initial sale price of Apple\u2019s iPhone X (64BG) was $999. The Trump administration\u2019s tariffs are based on the idea that since this smart phone is made in China, all value-added is captured in China and by China and thus it must be penalized by heavy tariffs.<\/p>\n

The breakdown of the iPhone X costs comprises both manufacturing costs ($378) and value shared between distributors and Apple ($621), which accounts for almost two-thirds<\/i><\/em>\u00a0of total costs. Another fourth<\/i><\/em>\u00a0of the total consists of various components made in South Korea, Japan, the US, UK, Switzerland, and Singapore.<\/p>\n

China\u2019s key contribution is in the basic manufacturing costs ($8) plus battery packs ($6), which is less than 4 percent of the manufacturing cost and 1.4 percent<\/i><\/em>\u00a0of the total cost of iPhone X (Figure<\/b><\/strong>).<\/p>\n

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Figure <\/b><\/strong> How Apple Captures the Smartphone Value-Added, Not China<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

iPhone X (64GB): Breakdown of Full Costs <\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

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Black = <\/i><\/em> Value shared between distributors and Apple \u00a0<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

Green =<\/i><\/em> Modules made in several advanced economies \u00a0<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

Red = <\/i><\/em> Basic manufacturing, battery packs in China<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

White =<\/i><\/em> Information not available<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

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Source: DifferenceGroup, IHS Markit and Reuters<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

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Is the iPhoneX an exception? No. Before the fall of Nokia, Europe captured 51% of the value-added of the Nokia N95 smart phone, even when it was \u201cMade in China,\u201d because the final assembly (read: China) involved 2% of the overall value-added.<\/p>\n

Obviously, the share of Chinese value-added differs by industries and companies, yet it tends be very low in the case of multinational companies operating in China, particularly in advanced technology. The same goes for such companies operating in India or other emerging markets. \u201cMade in China\u201d value-added does not go to China.<\/p>\n

That’s precisely why Beijing seeks China\u2019s rapid transition from exports and investment toward innovation and consumption. After all, like Apple and Nokia, Chinese industry giants \u2013 from Huawei and Xiaomi to Oppo and Vivo \u2013 capture far more of the value-added. As Vice Premier Liu He has urged, China must innovate if it wants to be a world leader in science and technology.<\/p>\n

US taxation fails Americans, not China<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

There is one critical difference, however. Through taxation, Nokia\u2019s success benefited Finnish taxpayers and its European investors. Most EU multinationals are constrained by similar taxation rules. In contrast, Apple\u2019s success does not necessarily accrue to American taxpayers because many US multinationals, unlike their European counterparts rely on creative tax accounting or tax havens.<\/p>\n

Theoretically, Apple should be the largest taxpayer in the world and pay $38 billion in taxes brought home from overseas and \u201ccreate\u201d 20,000 new jobs. But as Fortune<\/i><\/em>\u00a0has reported, that\u2019s all spin. Instead, Apple plans to collect a huge windfall from the Republicans\u2019 corporate tax handout. Currently it holds about $252 billion – more than 90% of its cash – in profits offshore, where it can avoid paying US taxes.<\/p>\n

Indeed, before<\/i><\/em>\u00a0Trump\u2019s tax code overhaul, Apple would have paid $79 billion in taxes if it had brought the money home. But it didn\u2019t. Instead, it let the cash sit offshore for years. So its offshore profits will be taxed at a one-time, 15.5% repatriation rate. All other corporate profits will be taxed at 21% (down from the pre-Trump rate of 35%).<\/p>\n

In the postwar era, the old adage was \u201cWhat\u2019s good for General Motors is good for America.\u201d What Apple and many other US multinationals are doing today may not be illegal, but it is part of a broader problem associated with America\u2019s decline.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the bottom line: Chinese share of 2%+ of the value-added pie is not the problem. Trump\u2019s tariffs are a misguided solution to a wrong problem.<\/p>\n

The real question is why US companies\u2019 lucrative profits yield so few benefits to ordinary Americans but such great benefits to few and wealthy corporate insiders.<\/p>\n

About the Author:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Dan Steinbock is the founder of Difference Group and has served as research director of international business at the India, China and America Institute (US) and a visiting fellow at the Shanghai Institute for International Studies (China) and the EU Center (Singapore). For more, see <\/i><\/em>http:\/\/www.differencegroup.net\/<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

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Trump tariffs penalize US multinationals as US taxation fails Americans By Dan Steinbock Trump tariffs are based on flawed pre-global doctrines, which penalize US multinationals, as evidenced by Apple. It is not China that fails Americans, but US taxation, as evidenced by Apple. In the pre-1914 era and during the protectionist interwar period, global economic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-133933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","no-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133933"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133933\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133935,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133933\/revisions\/133935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}