Despite President Donald Trump’s repeated attempts to pull more Apple device assembly back to the United States, the New York Times today points to the Mac Pro’s troubled Texas assembly lines as an example of why iPhones won’t be built in the country they’re designed. While the report spotlights limited local availability of custom screws as one issue, the larger problem is a lack of U.S. manufacturing infrastructure compared with that in China.
In late 2012, Apple confirmed that it would build a Macintosh computer in the U.S., making the device the first major Apple product in years to be assembled within the country. Bypassing Chinese manufacturers such as Foxconn, Pegatron, and Wistron, Apple partnered with Flextronics for the Mac Pro, quietly offloading day-to-day assembly challenges to an Austin, Texas factory.
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