I’m in the HN minority that actually likes Apple’s products and business model. I like the consistency the closed ecosystem brings, I like the product design, I like the vertical integration.
But this union stuff pisses me off to no end. Apple has high margins and is generally ahead of competitors in things like sustainability and supplier responsibility (yes yes not perfect, I just said ahead).
It would be 100% in line with the company’s ethos to embrace unions. Not necessarily to encourage, but certainly to treat them as an important part of the economy and a good check/balance to ensure the benefits of customer loyalty and high margins are shared with those who make it happen.
Just like renewables or supply chain audits, this wouldn’t have huge impacts on profits but it would make the world better. Serious misstep by Apple that pisses me off.
I don't think you're in the minority at all. Just look at the massive number of comments any time some new iToy gets announced.
But putting aside the tech jihad for a moment, I'm curious:
> It would be 100% in line with the company’s ethos to embrace unions
What gives you that impression? I admit I'm a hater of all big tech, but I think an objective view of Apple shows that they're a brutally self-interested megacorp. Even if you believe all their marketing about how they are consumer focused, that wouldn't logically extend to them treating their employees well. It's not in their interests to do so (at least in this case), and Apple is basically immune to bad press so it's not like it'd affect their image.
IMO Apple is ahead of the industry in supply chain ethics. They investigate their supply chain and produce reports[1] that are PR, sure, but also pretty transparent. Apple hired independent companies to interview employees of suppliers and a pretty decent scale. It's really worth reading the report, even if it's likely to confirm biases. I'm not aware of similar efforts from other consumer electronics manufacturers. Things like:
> Each year, the independent, third-party auditing firms we work with to conduct supplier assessments interview tens of thousands of supplier employees in their local languages — and without their managers or cameras present — to determine whether their experiences on the job align with our observations during assessments. Interview participation is completely voluntary, and we keep responses confidential. In 2023, we interviewed over 65,000 people as part of supplier assessments.
You can wave it away as all a big PR campaign, and I'm mostly onboard with the myth of altruism point of view, but I'm not saying that Apple "should" support unions out of altruism, but rather because it aligns with their other activities, regardless of whether those are altruistic or cynical psyops or whatever.
What if Steve Jobs wore green instead of black when announcing the iPhone? Would Apple still be the same company today?
Who cares? That's a stupid question, we can't possibly know and either way we can't change the past. What we CAN do is change how things are now and implement a union with Apple as it is today. Why postulate about the upbringing of the company and how things could have been different ideologically when that's not what the discussion is about? People just want job security, protection from abuse by their employer, and reasonably consistent raises to at least match inflation.
But this union stuff pisses me off to no end. Apple has high margins and is generally ahead of competitors in things like sustainability and supplier responsibility (yes yes not perfect, I just said ahead).
It would be 100% in line with the company’s ethos to embrace unions. Not necessarily to encourage, but certainly to treat them as an important part of the economy and a good check/balance to ensure the benefits of customer loyalty and high margins are shared with those who make it happen.
Just like renewables or supply chain audits, this wouldn’t have huge impacts on profits but it would make the world better. Serious misstep by Apple that pisses me off.