Designed in California, made in America: Apple to build new Macs in Texas

Macs-made-in-usa-flag — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Soon enough, Texas will be known for more than black gold, barbecue, cowboys, and George W. Bush. Texas oozes “Amurika,” so what better place for Apple to open up a manufacturing plant to build its next-generation Macs?

Back in December, Apple CEO Tim Cook said in an interview that a line of Mac computers would be produced in the U.S. in 2013, bringing back some much needed manufacturing jobs.

In yesterday’s Senate hearing to talk about the overseas tax loopholes Apple’s allegedly been jumping through, Cook announced the company is investing $100 million for “a new Mac product line” that’ll be built in Texas. Components will be made in Illinois and Florida, and the Macs will “rely on equipment produced in Kentucky and Michigan,” Cook said.

This isn’t the first product Apple’s made in the USA by any means. The company has had plants in various U.S. cities since 1980, and as Cook stressed in the hearing, parts for the iPhone and iPad are already made in Texas, and the iPhone’s glass comes from Kentucky.

But although Cook spoke of all the good things Apple’s doing for America – “Apple is responsible for creating or supporting 600,00 new jobs” – it wasn’t really the jobs that the Senate was concerned with, which brings us back to that whole foreign income thing. Without getting too much into it, Apple does much of its foreign business through an Irish company, which is where the loophole lies: conducting business in Ireland means you don’t have to pay taxes there, and Apple’s allegedly been sidestepping paying tens of billions of dollars in revenue this way.

So whether you side with those like Senator John McCain who thinks “Apple is one of the great tax avoiders in U.S. history,” or with Apple, which argues it pays “an extraordinary amount” in U.S. taxes – about $6 billion in 2012 – there’s one thing we can’t argue over: Apple’s building new Macs! In the U.S.A.!

However, though rumors of a U.S.-built Mac have been buzzing for the last five months, we feel inclined to point out that Cook still didn’t unveil what kind of Mac would be built there. Stay tuned for more details.

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