It’s not like Apple is an outlier and non-richest companies are any better. Electronics manufacturing, as well as many other kinds of manufacturing (e.g., clothing which is even more notorious), operate on razor thin margins. Guess how much you can realistically pay workers when you make a grand total of <$5[1] on a $1k device? Not gonna come close to U.S. minimum wage, that’s for sure.
Anyway, this kind of exploitation is part of how Western companies accumulate wealth and it partially funds your first world salaries and lifestyles.
[1] The higher estimates I’ve seen are always <$10, and lower estimates are way under.
Manufacturing margins are razor thin. The brand names pocket all the profits, the people producing commodity parts and assembling them get nothing, which is my entire point.
And no, Apple is not an outlier in that regard, even though they pocket more than HP, Dell, etc.
Anyway, this kind of exploitation is part of how Western companies accumulate wealth and it partially funds your first world salaries and lifestyles.
[1] The higher estimates I’ve seen are always <$10, and lower estimates are way under.