Apple says it has created or supported more than a million U.S. jobs

Apple, criticized for manufacturing its computing devices overseas instead of in the U.S., is putting a number to the jobs it has created or supported at home: 1.03 million.

Applications designed for Apple’s smartphones and tablets have helped create more than 627,000 U.S. jobs, 334,000 jobs have resulted from its spending and growth, and 66,000 people work directly for the company in the U.S., Apple said. Revenue generated through its App Store rose 50 percent to a record in 2014, Apple said.

“Apple ignited the app revolution with the launch of the App Store in 2008,” the company said. “Since then, an entire industry has been built around app design and development.”

In 2013, customers spent more than $10 billion in the App Store.

Apple, which until the late 1990s made and assembled many products in the U.S., shifted manufacturing to Asia to take advantage of the region’s lower labor costs. But chief executive Tim Cook has worked in the past few years to boost U.S. manufacturing and open domestic data centers.

Bloomberg News

This story was originally published January 8, 2015 at 3:16 PM with the headline "Apple says it has created or supported more than a million U.S. jobs."