We’ve seen plenty of evidence that the current inflation is almost entirely driven by companies price gouging consumers.

And actually, the fact that the price hasn’t increased is pretty obvious evidence of this.

Do you think, for one second, Apple would accept any appreciable hit to its profit margin if their costs had inflated 1:1 with consumer prices? Especially when they have a perfect excuse to blame a price increase on?

The phone may cost them a little more to make than last year, but I doubt it’s that much.

There’s tons of elasticity built into the pricing already so that carriers can offer discounts.

The point is kind of moot because the phone definitely comes with the cable: https://www.apple.com/iphone-16/specs/

The article is actually about the new AirPods. I was going entirely off the information in the comment I was replying to.

The thing is, the iPhone 14, 15 and 16 all have the same launch price: $799 US

Adjusted for inflation, the 14 and 15 may have cost more, but Apple is almost certainly making that money back somewhere else. Like, say, making people pay for accessories that used to be included?

And at the end of the day, the prices consumers pay for end products don’t follow the exact same curve as the prices megacorporations pay for materials and labor. We’ve seen plenty of evidence that the current inflation is almost entirely driven by companies price gouging consumers. So it’s not really reasonable to assume that Apple’s costs have gone up 1:1 with consumer prices anyway.

But here’s the question: does it cost Apple $20 to make a cable? I seriously doubt it. It probably costs them closer to 20 cents per cable. So in reality, they now make approximately $20 more from every sale than they did before.

Sure, not everyone is buying a cable with every phone. But cables get lost, they wear out, they get stolen by your kids to charge their iPhones because they broke theirs, they get chewed up by pets, etc.

And you can bet your ass that, just like any other high-margin item, the people in the Apple store are gonna be incentivized like hell to get every customer to buy a cable with their phone whether they really need it or not:

Do you have a charging cable?

Is it an Apple cable?

Are you sure you have one that’s USB-C and supports USB Power Delivery?

And it’s not worn out?

You say your dog chewed on it a little but it’s mostly intact and still works?

Well, I’d recommend getting a new one anyway.

Yeah you can get your own if you want but it’s best if you get an Apple cable.

OK great, that comes out to $820 total. And do you want to insure your phone for $5 a month?

It’s fine if they reduce the price accordingly.

If it’s still the same price after they take the cable out, it was never about reducing waste to begin with.

Knowing Apple, that wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest, which is why I never have and never will own any of their products.

I feel like you either fear and/or despise generative AI, or you think it’s the best thing since sliced bread.

There seems to be very little in-between.

Don’t show them this, it’ll shatter their reality

Ffs, are the Danish getting uppity again? It’s been a quiet few hundred years

I’m no lawyer but I think drilling into someone’s head without permission might still count as assault.

In all fairness, I think it was a joke.

Jfc, having the girl in the room at all is a liability, let alone letting her touch the patient.

I hope this guy’s malpractice lawyer has good heart meds.

And think about this: unlike celery, it’s a true calorie-negative snack.

Cause, you know, thermodynamics.

Bruh if I’m eating something out of a can it might be because I’m too lazy and lacking in foresight to cook shit and freeze it ahead of time.

Bruh if I’m eating something out of a can it might be because it’s 3 AM and I’m too lazy to cook for myself.

I got a can of these Pork and Beans cause my dad used to feed them to me as a kid and I was craving them.

Skimpflation is real ya’ll. There wasn’t a single piece of meat in the whole fucking can. And it was blander than I remember. I threw out most of it cause I couldn’t see myself finishing it.

Don’t even need an AI. Just teach a parrot to say “let’s circle back on this” and “how many story points is that?”

Even if it didn’t, any middle manager who decides to replace their dev team with AI is going to realize pretty quickly that actually writing code is only a small part of the job.

Won’t stop 'em from trying, of course. But when the laid-off devs get frantic calls from management asking them to come back and fix everything, they’ll be in a good position to negotiate a raise.

My last optometrist refused to tell me what my prescription was. I should have insisted, they’ve since closed up shop.

Hypothetically speaking, how might one be able to get their hands on this candy?

I need it for my… ADHD

You know, I always figured optometry involved like, super complicated math and shit.

Turns out it’s just basic arithmetic.

Kinda like programming, in a way.

Can I just say I’m so proud of this comments section