Why it's almost impossible to produce a smartphone in the United States
The article explains that manufacturing a smartphone in the United States is nearly impossible due to the lack of a domestic supply chain for key components, such as displays, batteries, and chips, as well as the high labor and regulatory costs compared to Asia, where most production is concentrated.
Background
The article explains why the US cannot realistically manufacture smartphones at scale, despite political pushes to reshore production. Key context: ~90% of advanced chips come from Taiwan's TSMC; most displays from South Korea and China; rare-earth processing is China-dominated. No US factory makes the tiny ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) or precision glass needed. Even if assembly happened in America, nearly every component would be imported. Past attempts (Google's "Made in USA" Moto X in 2013, Apple's Mac Pro assembly in Texas) showed 15–30% cost penalties. The core argument: profitable smartphone production requires the dense component ecosystem of places like Shenzhen, which took decades to build and no US city currently has.