“Consumers have been slower than expected to embrace using their phones to pay for goods and services at the cash register,” Shara Tibken reports for CNET. “Yet Apple CEO Tim Cook is still hoping for the demise of physical currency.”
“That’s one of the key takeaways from Cook, who spoke at the company’s annual shareholder meeting Tuesday,” Tibken reports. “Cook also touched on the booming wearables business and the opportunity in health care. Likewise, he addressed the tax reforms passed in December and his vision for the future.”
“‘I’m hoping that I’m still going to be alive to see the elimination of money,’ Cook said during the shareholder meeting. ‘Mobile payments have taken off slower than I personally would have thought if you asked me sitting here a few years ago,’ Cook said,” Tibken reports. “In the US, companies aren’t always motivated to make innovative health care products because they’re focused on what can be reimbursed by Medicare or Medicaid, Cook said. That’s not always in the patient’s best interest, he added.”
“The company will pay $38 billion in taxes to bring the money back to the US. Apple said it plans to invest $30 billion in the US over the next five years by building its new campus and creating 20,000 new jobs,” Tibken reports. “Factoring in current spending, product sales tax and taxes on employees’ wages, Apple said it expects to contribute $350 billion to the US economy over that period.”
Much more in the full article – recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: A good compendium of this year’s shareholders meeting.
We use Apple Pay pretty much daily, usually multiple times per day, and we haven’t used our iPhones at a cash register since April 2015.
(We use our Apple Watches.)
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]