Foxconn Raising Prices to Avoid Further Suicides
Foxconn is passing some of those increased wage costs onto its clients.
Hon Hai, or Foxconn, is essentially the manager of one of the world's major electronics factories. Foxconn is one of the premier manufacturers of electronics designed by Apple, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Microsoft, Dell, HP, among many others.
Although Foxconn is usually in the background, as the designers and sellers of the electronics take the spotlight, the manufacturing company has been under scrutiny for the working conditions that it gives to its workers.
A flurry of suicides cast a light on Foxconn and its employment practices. In response, Foxconn vowed to improve working conditions as well as increase wages (though there's still some question as to how effective the changes are). Such increases come at an added operating cost for Foxconn, and some of that cost is going to be passed on to the company's clients.
According to Reuters, Foxconn will be raising prices starting this month for some of the services that it provides to its clients, including Apple. Given that iSuppli estimates that the iPhone 4 costs $6.54 to make in China, it's doubtful that Apple will be feeling any sort of pinch from a higher rate.

Did you even READ the article?
Jobs: "We incresed the price of iPhone 4 from $799 to $999 because Foxconn raised it's production value from $6.54 to $6.75 in order to compensate the workers and decrease suicides. Apple simply follows the rules."
Did you even READ the article?
Jobs: "We incresed the price of iPhone 4 from $799 to $999 because Foxconn raised it's production value from $6.54 to $6.75 in order to compensate the workers and decrease suicides. Apple simply follows the rules."
Doubt difference will be more then 20-30$.
As already said by some companies making electronics, salary is making only ~20% of manufacturing expenses.
oh well..we all hate CEO's but i guess thats life.
By the same token, the US has never been prosperous since we gave up on job protectionism to pursue cheap-labor AKA neo-slavery. It's been one continuous downhill slide, and it won't get better until we move jobs back here, and pay a living wage for them.
I wonder what the salary increase is. Didn't they double it or something a month ago? From a nickel to a dime a day?
http://www.isuppli.com/Teardowns-Manufacturing-and-Pricing/News/Pages/iPhone-4-Carries-Bill-of-Materials-of-187-51-According-to-iSuppli.aspx
This is very low quality research, to say the least...
187.51 is the parts the $6.54 is the assembly cost.
That's 20% if current salaries. If you factor in the low pay and exchange rates and cost of living, that would make a huge difference. Some places people are living on a U.S. dollar a day. Now in the U.S. that is way below what would be necessary but in other countries, that dollar will go alot further. Say you have 100 workers making 1 U.S. dollar a day. Your daily cost for labor of manufacturing is $100 U.S. Now if that same product were made in America where the minimum wage is $7.25/hr those same 100 workers would cost the manufacturer $5800 per day. That is a 5800% increase. Now I'm not condoning extreme working conditions where peoples lives are in danger and deaths are occuring due to the conditions, however, other countries that have lower costs of living along with fewer government safety regulations that must be implemented, it will always be considerably cheaper for the producer to use overseas labor.
actually its great research... its how much they charge to MAKE the phone... as in put the pieces together not the cost of the actual parts