patrick.net

Bellingham Bill says

So some mom & pop retail outlet busting their asses to break even pays 15%, and the richest private sector entity on the planet pays 2%.

Whatta great economy we've got.

15%? Muahahaha, try 40%. That's why the only reasonable (and fair) solution is a flat 25% tax for everybody (or lower if possible).

mell says

15%? Muahahaha, try 40%. That's why the only reasonable (and fair) solution is a flat 25% tax for everybody (or lower if possible).

Says the guy that obviously didn't read the article. hint: it's not about tax

Not exactly a federal tax, but certainly a "tax" for membership in the mall.

Frightful. I was struck at a very young age how the costs of running a small business seemed so disadvantageous alongside those of a large business. That's when I said, screw it, and I brought my small capital to a country where the playing field was, on this dimension, much less stacked against me.

It takes money to make money, and especially for the american way of doing things---big conglomerates with access to lobbyists and influencing government.

As they say discuss on Quora about the way multi-millionaires and billionaires think that makes them so successful, paraphrasing here: they consider the world a set of puzzles pieces which they have the ability to move around.

And so it goes.

The average Apple store generates about $6,000 in sales a square foot, though its highest-grossing stores can pull in as much as $10,000, the industry executives said. Apple’s share of gross sales at 45 enclosed shopping malls averaged 14% in 2013, up from about 2.5% in 2002, according to an analysis by Mr. Cirz. In a handful of malls in New England, Apple accounts for as much as a third of total sales, Mr. Cirz said.

Damn!

This whole article strikes me as a nothingburger. The concept of charging a percentage of sales for the lease seems corrupt, anyway, but it's what the traffic will bear.

Sure, Apple is evil, but they're still paying massive rents compared with the other tenants, while bringing in at least a little money to the surrounding frozen yogurt and shoe shops.

I wonder what will happen to big-box and indoor malls over the next 25 years.

When I'm in an indoor mall, I spend at least part of my time staring into one store after another and thinking "How on earth do you sell enough to make your lease?"

lahossain says

Not exactly a federal tax, but certainly a "tax" for membership in the mall.

Frightful. I was struck at a very young age how the costs of running a small business seemed so disadvantageous alongside those of a large business. That's when I said, screw it, and I brought my small capital to a country where the playing field was, on this dimension, much less stacked against me.

It takes money to make money, and especially for the american way of doing things---big conglomerates with access to lobbyists and influencing government.

As they say discuss on Quora about the way multi-millionaires and billionaires think that makes them so successful, paraphrasing here: they consider the world a set of puzzles pieces which they have the ability to move around.

And so it goes.

I'd say it's less about big vs. small and more about successful vs. less successful. Apple brings people to the mall so they are desirable. Microsoft or Sony is also quite large, but I'm fairly certain they don't get the same deals on rent on their stores.

And calling rent a tax is a bit of a stretch.

What Apple is not a liberal company?

It has been that way since the beginning of time

tatupu70 says

rent a tax is a bit of a stretch

RE rents have an embedded site value component and that part is pretty much uncollected taxes.

Imagine if Congress licensed the air like they sold off the EM spectrum, requiring everyone to pay $5 to ComO2 for each day's oxygen intake.

Rent, tax, or toll, it's money leaving the productive economy to the rent-seeking one. That's what's happening with land, but we're so immersed in this we can't even sense it.

Like the EM spectrum, all the usable stuff has been privatized and is in the hands of the takers.

Anyhoo Apple as a corporation has created more real-world wealth lo these past 40 years than anyone I can think of -- ca. 1980 Apple II+, 1986 Macintosh Plus + LaserWriter, late 80s Macintosh II series (fully 5 years ahead of the efforts of MSFT, DR, IBM, etc), early 1990s NeXT (www got going on that first by no accident), 2007-now iPhone series, 2010-now iPad series. They've also made the finest laptops for the past 20+ years. Each of the product waves has created an immense forward impetus in the usability and utility of personal and professional computing.

The funny thing is that most of that list didn't make them a whole lot of money, but first to really solve the pocket computing product puzzle + armies of skilled Chinese tech labor to make the box = bam! trillion dollar market cap on the way!

(Even as late as 2010 I had no idea that everyone would soon discard their flip phones. I must be the last person on the planet without a glowing rectangle for a phone)

Apple is a funny company, a true paragon of healthy competitive capitalism.

They got where they are by being the best at what they do (making cool stuff), not with stupid business tricks* like Microsoft's predatory business practices they enjoyed engaging in in the 1980s and 90s.

The company as individuals is rather liberal:

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/03/tim-cook-climate-change-sceptics-ditch-apple-shares

and in my mind its closest analogue is BMW or Mercedes. Are they evil? Or just making product that people want to buy?

It's just got 4X the market cap of these two thanks to selling $600 - $1000 devices to 300M people a year -- one out of 25 people on the planet.

* The one anti-competitive thing I'm aware they're doing is locking up supply of components, most infamously buying up every 1.8" HD Toshiba could make for the iPod, thereby cornering the market on gigabyte pocket music players until flash got that capacity.

Back to my point with this thread, it's funny how our system rewards the winners and fucks over the losers. Not very stable in the long run.

The only way to get ahead is to have the customers pay you directly. Small business owners at least have that going for them.

carrieon says

The only way to get ahead is to have the customers pay you directly. Small business owners at least have that going for them.

Small business owners too often have their whole lives and fortunes wrapped up in their business.

Easy to end up living in a cardboard box under the bridge. I've watched it happen to several people.

Well then you can eat a dozen of them and not worry about about becoming knowledge obese...

HydroCabron says

This whole article strikes me as a nothingburger.

Another way the rich are getting richer. With everyone leveraged to the max you are transferring wealth up to the top via interest payments. (even with today low rates)
A reason to avoid becoming a"debt slave"

Mark says

Another way the rich are getting richer. With everyone leveraged to the max you are transferring wealth up to the top via interest payments. (even with today low rates)

A reason to avoid becoming a"debt slave"

Not really. Paying them rent is no better.

Bill has tripped over and myopically ignored the real way the rich get richer, that dwarfs what Apple is doing, to get to this "analysis" of how how the rich are getting richer.

"So yes Bill, they are predatory in some ways like Microsoft, it isn't all about selling "cool stuff" that is driving their bottom line."

Using Apple's media storefronts is optional for the consumer, except for apps.

30% off the top was defendable back when Apple was pioneering the AppStore, but now it is a significant toll to reach the Apple user base.

But in terms of Apple's revenue, it's not a major driver:

MRQ:

iPhone/iPad: $60B
Macs: $7B
Services: $5B

tatupu70 says

Paying them rent is no better.

LOL, I wish rent was tax deductible! I'd be ~$60,000 richer!

3% interest on a $350,000 place (20% down, 15 year loan) averages to $250/mo for the life of the loan, ~$400 w/o the MID.

"the real way the rich get richer"

^ per capita (15-64) health and housing costs (2009 dollars)

everything else is noise!

to make real money in this country, you go into RE and/or healthcare.

Just learned recently my mom's doctor owns several apartment complexes, LOL

Apple's digital distribution position -- while certainly a nice skim as the "long tail" gets longer -- hasn't harmed the world like Microsoft's anti-competitive practices.

Microsoft did their damnedest to kill Netscape's chances as a competitor to their Win32 platform lock on PC app development, apparently put the IE group on ice after 6, only to see Google come out of nowhere and eat their online lunch, dinner, and dessert. Breakfast the next day too, for that matter.

Now with HTML5 and the increasing capability of browser-hosted apps, Microsoft is finding new religion and getting on the JavaScript train, even to the point of trying to expose a substantial Windows API subset to JS, LOL.

http://www.i-programmer.info/professional-programmer/i-programmer/2591-dumping-net-microsofts-madness.html

Microsoft's transition from a small IBM OEM provider in 1980 to the powerhouse of 1990 also damaged the tech world and thus everyone (since tech is so important for labor-saving wealth creation). How they got to 1990 from 1980 is full of dodgy practices, and what's more Windows 3 was still an utter piece of crap platform that at the time I could not understand how anyone would willingly submit themselves to using.

As a CS major in the late 80s I puttered about in Visual C on MS-DOS, it wasn't bad -- and Turbo Pascal was pretty damn fun in retrospect -- but once I saw my first Mac II I knew what computer I had to get. Not that the Mac II was all that great compared to what was to come, or even what it could have been if Apple had just an ounce of common sense back then [the LC should have been Apple's first 68020 product], but what it was was still pretty astounding for 1987, and 1989 especially once they hacked together the cooperative multitasking in System 6.

(oh, and Think C totally killed Turbo Pascal as an IDE)

Microsoft worked hard to kill any competitors to its monopoly position on the x86 platform, and even PCs overall, refusing to develop apps for nascent competitors like Amiga and NeXT, crippling the utility of those platforms given how important Microsoft document formats had become in the late 80s and 90s.

BeOS of course ran into the Microsoft buzzsaw in the mid-90s. It was only the rise of the www out of nowhere that saved personal computing from Microsoft's Stalinist regime, LOL.

The funny thing is that 90% of my day is spent in C# now, I love that language. Speaking of which, back to "work"!

BB said: Now with HTML5 and the increasing capability of browser-hosted apps, Microsoft is finding new religion and getting on the JavaScript train
That could be just what the nascent smartwatchphone market needs as the Koreans try break free from Google/Android. Samsung has Tizen and LG is giving WebOS a try for watches. At any rate, it will be interesting to see if the smartwatchphone replaces/supplants smartphones, or if they exist only as smartphone tethered accessories (or disappear totally, for that matter).

Bellingham Bill says

So some mom & pop retail outlet busting their asses to break even pays 15%, and the richest private sector entity on the planet pays 2%.

Whatta great economy we've got.

The article says Apple pays more on a sq ft basis due to it's high volume.
When I go visit the Apple store at the mall we end up having lunch or dinner. We also visit other stores where we might buy some stuff. Clearly, Apple is a magnet for customers that ends up benefiting all the retailers at the mall.

there i fixed it for you...

Strategist says

Clearly, Apple is a magnet for customers that ends up benefiting all the retailers at the mall. suckers that enjoy being herded into a closed communist environment.

Bellingham Bill says

^ per capita (15-64) health and housing costs (2009 dollars)

everything else is noise!

to make real money in this country, you go into RE and/or healthcare.

And where does Billy think the inflation in these two sectors comes from? Hint the Fed has something to do with the latter and the Fed government something to do with the prior of course with the help of the aforementioned...