Apple's Claims Of Creating 500,000 Jobs May Be Overblown

Remember that UPS truck driver that delivered your iPad? Apple wants credit for the creation of that job.

The world's most valuable company released a study last week claiming that it's supported more than 500,000 jobs. The report, commissioned by Apple and completed by the Analysis Group, found that the company indirectly or directly created more than 300,000 jobs in the U.S. and supports more than 200,000 jobs through the app economy -- including factory employees that manufacture glass for its iPods and iPads and the UPS and FedEx drivers that deliver the devices.

The problem? That may not exactly be true. Though Apple certainly adds jobs in the U.S. and abroad, it's unlikely the company did so at the rate it claims or at a pace as high as many other technology companies, according to CBS News columnist Erik Sherman. In addition, economist David Autor called the company's direct and indirect job creation claims "disreputable" in an e-mail to The New York Times, because it's hard to tell if many of the workers would have had jobs with other companies anyway.

And Apple's not alone in making dubious job creation claims. Facebook has been estimated to have created more than 200,000 jobs. Apple's rival, Microsoft, touted a report Monday that indicates cloud computing will create 14 million jobs by 2015.

This isn't the first time in recent weeks Apple has taken heat for labor-related issues. Foxconn, one of the major manufacturers of Apple's products, has come under fire for working conditions in its Chinese factories. In addition, the company has been criticized for outsourcing jobs instead of hiring workers at home.

Even if Apple's claims of U.S. job creation are overblown, the company is still at the forefront of an industry that's fueled intense job growth. The move from 2G to 3G technologies created 1.5 million jobs, according to a January study from two economists cited by Bloomberg. In addition, the "app economy" has created 500,000 jobs since 2007, according to the Atlantic.

Still, demand for jobs that drive said app economy may be tapering out, though employers are still poaching workers with certain engineering skill sets, Bloomberg reports.

Comments

[becky bradshaw]

01:08 PM on 03/06/2012

Apple estimates that it employs 700,000 Chinese workers in the factories. Economists usually conclude that 3-4 support jobs per manufacturing job are lost when Apple outsourced its production. The total of between 2.8 and 3.5 million jobs, is much more conclusive than the recent Apple assertions of domestic employment.

Reference: http://businessfacilities.com/blog/thinking-differently/

[Veri]

11:17 AM on 03/06/2012

by that logic, Intel... creator of the modern CPU has created and continues to support untold millions of jobs generating piles (as in billions upon untold billions) of dollars, euro, yen and every currency in existence or formerly in existence, since the introduction of the CPU. Of which Apple is is a part of. I wonder what IBM has done.

[Poster999]

10:10 AM on 03/06/2012

Apple is a mega corporation and it's only interest is the bottom line, it could care less about creating jobs. The people who run it would lay everyone off including the Chinese if it would increase their profits. I don't know that this is either good or bad it's just the way capitalism works.

[Mister Grumpy]

09:50 AM on 03/06/2012

Of course it isn't true. But the drones will continue to believe whatever they're told.

[jcaunter]

08:15 AM on 03/06/2012

Sure, Apple can legitimately claim that it created well over 500,000 jobs, in China. Just look at how many employees Foxcon has.

[Mister Grumpy]

09:53 AM on 03/06/2012

The lawsuit that Apple is currently involved with says that they employ more than a million Chinese in the making of the iPad alone.

[StephenJK]

05:57 AM on 03/06/2012

Apple is now king of the world and can & will make whatever claims it sees fit in the improvement of it's image.

The company is based on sin. Hence it's logo.

[johnztucker]

04:19 AM on 03/06/2012

Unemployment numbers are comprised of those that are in the job market for the past 30 days. It does not include those that have not been in the job market in the last 30 days: people who have given up looking; those that have gone off unemployment because it has run out. One solution to unemployment is High Speed Universities check it out

[ttsgw]

03:22 AM on 03/06/2012

Why not count everyone that uses the i-things in their work?

[Billk29]

03:15 AM on 03/06/2012

Apple created all those jobs just like Big Macs are 100 percent beef.

[wilray]

01:10 AM on 03/06/2012

Ya think?!!

[llen]

12:50 AM on 03/06/2012

They may claim to have made all these jobs, but a big group of jobs are all in China. Now if they were to bring all that work back to the US....just think, the unemployment would possibly go down.

HP, Dell, Microsoft, Apple all have huge outsourced jobs in China. Even Facebook, they are building huge complex for their servers...in Europe.

Statistics can be written anyway they want to say anything they want, doesn't mean its true.

[Mister Grumpy]

09:56 AM on 03/06/2012

Yahoo is currently in the process of outsourcing 10,000 jobs to China and India.

[kamact]

12:05 AM on 03/06/2012

Okay, now move the manufacturing or assembly to America,....

[DRaymond]

11:57 PM on 03/05/2012

Apple has something of a pattern of exaggerating their importance.  For example there was the self-generated piece of folklore that Steve Jobs is the reason that any computers have multiple proportionally spaced fonts.  Proportionally spaced fonts were already part of the Xerox Star system before Apple used it as the starting point of the Mac.  The same Xerox system was also licensed to Microsoft, Sun, and others.   The real enabling technology of personal computer typography was the laser printer, another PARC, not Apple. invention.

http://betweenthenumbers.net/2011/10/steve-jobs-and-the-great-man-theory/

[theveggiedude]

08:11 AM on 03/06/2012

The Mac was a personal computer, The Xerox Star was not. How can you even compare the two? Steve Jobs put a GUI based machine in the hands of the public - a feat deemed impossible to do by Xerox.

[dngrwill]

08:51 AM on 03/06/2012

Ok, you know nothing. Please go to the 'gossip' section and comment about mrs lohan..
Oh, and you may want to read about Steve's job in burying Next Computer (and Business World with it).

People who have macs don't seem to know much about computers......

[derickma]

09:13 AM on 03/06/2012

I hate to break it to you ..Apple never invented anything..they just take ideas and make them look great and simple to use ..the let someone else do the hard work ..I'm not knocking them they have great products I use quite a few of them myself but to say apple made this and that is a disservice to the people who actually came up with the idea and turned it onto a product, not the people who make it look nice.

[Ross NW]

11:32 PM on 03/05/2012

Nobody believes the marketing promises that come out in ads or press releases. It's just like nobody really believes politicians, unless they really really want to. It doesn't really help companies to pump this stuff out in the end if they are interested in long-term loyalty. Apple should save a little money and cut the marketing department's budget. Pass the savings along to the consumer. That will help loyalty more.

[Ed whowannaknow]

11:28 PM on 03/05/2012

Jobs, like other CEO's, only care about money. Not America, not Americans. They would sell America to Iran if they could. Patriotism or American Exceptionalism means nothing to corporate America anymore.