A foreman immediately roused 8,000 workers inside the company’s dormitories, according to the executive. Each employee was given a biscuit and a cup of tea, guided to a workstation and within half an hour started a 12-hour shift fitting glass screens into beveled frames. Within 96 hours, the plant was producing over 10,000 iPhones a day.

“The speed and flexibility is breathtaking,” the executive said. “There’s no American plant that can match that.”

Similar stories could be told about almost any electronics company — and outsourcing has also become common in hundreds of industries, including accounting, legal services, banking, auto manufacturing and pharmaceuticals.

But while Apple is far from alone, it offers a window into why the success of some prominent companies has not translated into large numbers of domestic jobs. What’s more, the company’s decisions pose broader questions about what corporate America owes Americans as the global and national economies are increasingly intertwined.

“Companies once felt an obligation to support American workers, even when it wasn’t the best financial choice,” said Betsey Stevenson, the chief economist at the Labor Department until last September. “That’s disappeared. Profits and efficiency have trumped generosity.”

Companies and other economists say that notion is naïve. Though Americans are among the most educated workers in the world, the nation has stopped training enough people in the mid-level skills that factories need, executives say.

To thrive, companies argue they need to move work where it can generate enough profits to keep paying for innovation. Doing otherwise risks losing even more American jobs over time, as evidenced by the legions of once-proud domestic manufacturers — including G.M. and others — that have shrunk as nimble competitors have emerged.

Apple was provided with extensive summaries of The New York Times’s reporting for this article, but the company, which has a reputation for secrecy, declined to comment.

This article is based on interviews with more than three dozen current and former Apple employees and contractors — many of whom requested anonymity to protect their jobs — as well as economists, manufacturing experts, international trade specialists, technology analysts, academic researchers, employees at Apple’s suppliers, competitors and corporate partners, and government officials.

Privately, Apple executives say the world is now such a changed place that it is a mistake to measure a company’s contribution simply by tallying its employees — though they note that Apple employs more workers in the United States than ever before.

They say Apple’s success has benefited the economy by empowering entrepreneurs and creating jobs at companies like cellular providers and businesses shipping Apple products. And, ultimately, they say curing unemployment is not their job.

“We sell iPhones in over a hundred countries,” a current Apple executive said. “We don’t have an obligation to solve America’s problems. Our only obligation is making the best product possible.”

‘I Want a Glass Screen’

In 2007, a little over a month before the iPhone was scheduled to appear in stores, Mr. Jobs beckoned a handful of lieutenants into an office. For weeks, he had been carrying a prototype of the device in his pocket.

Mr. Jobs angrily held up his iPhone, angling it so everyone could see the dozens of tiny scratches marring its plastic screen, according to someone who attended the meeting. He then pulled his keys from his jeans.

People will carry this phone in their pocket, he said. People also carry their keys in their pocket. “I won’t sell a product that gets scratched,” he said tensely. The only solution was using unscratchable glass instead. “I want a glass screen, and I want it perfect in six weeks.”

After one executive left that meeting, he booked a flight to Shenzhen, China. If Mr. Jobs wanted perfect, there was nowhere else to go.

For over two years, the company had been working on a project — code-named Purple 2 — that presented the same questions at every turn: how do you completely reimagine the cellphone? And how do you design it at the highest quality — with an unscratchable screen, for instance — while also ensuring that millions can be manufactured quickly and inexpensively enough to earn a significant profit?

The answers, almost every time, were found outside the United States. Though components differ between versions, all iPhones contain hundreds of parts, an estimated 90 percent of which are manufactured abroad. Advanced semiconductors have come from Germany and Taiwan, memory from Korea and Japan, display panels and circuitry from Korea and Taiwan, chipsets from Europe and rare metals from Africa and Asia. And all of it is put together in China.

In its early days, Apple usually didn’t look beyond its own backyard for manufacturing solutions. A few years after Apple began building the Macintosh in 1983, for instance, Mr. Jobs bragged that it was “a machine that is made in America.” In 1990, while Mr. Jobs was running NeXT, which was eventually bought by Apple, the executive told a reporter that “I’m as proud of the factory as I am of the computer.” As late as 2002, top Apple executives occasionally drove two hours northeast of their headquarters to visit the company’s iMac plant in Elk Grove, Calif.

But by 2004, Apple had largely turned to foreign manufacturing. Guiding that decision was Apple’s operations expert, Timothy D. Cook, who replaced Mr. Jobs as chief executive last August, six weeks before Mr. Jobs’s death. Most other American electronics companies had already gone abroad, and Apple, which at the time was struggling, felt it had to grasp every advantage.

In part, Asia was attractive because the semiskilled workers there were cheaper. But that wasn’t driving Apple. For technology companies, the cost of labor is minimal compared with the expense of buying parts and managing supply chains that bring together components and services from hundreds of companies.

For Mr. Cook, the focus on Asia “came down to two things,” said one former high-ranking Apple executive. Factories in Asia “can scale up and down faster” and “Asian supply chains have surpassed what’s in the U.S.” The result is that “we can’t compete at this point,” the executive said.

The impact of such advantages became obvious as soon as Mr. Jobs demanded glass screens in 2007.

For years, cellphone makers had avoided using glass because it required precision in cutting and grinding that was extremely difficult to achieve. Apple had already selected an American company, Corning Inc., to manufacture large panes of strengthened glass. But figuring out how to cut those panes into millions of iPhone screens required finding an empty cutting plant, hundreds of pieces of glass to use in experiments and an army of midlevel engineers. It would cost a fortune simply to prepare.

1. Snoop around a bit.

Don’t go to a blind date without having any hint as to what kind of person you are about to entrust your one evening with.   A little bit of planning will go a long way toward having a successful blind date.  Talk on the phone. Email each other. Do those mild background checking techniques that will make you less worried when the actual date happens.

2. Go for a casual date.  It is never cool to plan like you are about to make a marriage proposal when you are just about to go to a blind date. A cozy café or park that allows lots of conversation and exchange of ideas will do the trick.

3. First impressions last forever.  Blind dates should be informal. However, that doesn’t mean you are allowed to show up in your gym clothes. Overdressing is overkill, too. Women, any suggestive outfit should be saved for your fifth or sixth date if you click. Men, keep your bowties and suits reserved for your wedding. It would be wise to show your personal taste as long as you strike a good balance.

4. Know your manners.

A blind date could still go bad no matter how you prepare for it. It is just the way of nature telling you that the chemistry is just not there. But the lack of spark during the first date does not necessarily translate to never clicking with the person. It could be that it is just a bad day for the two of you or the weather is simply not cooperating. Keeping an open mind will avoid you from sulking about how bad your date went. Don’t forget to respect your date as you would like to be respected. Don’t be too rigid, have fun.

Christian online dating provides a very comfortable environment and is considered safe. The online dating community is a place where you can create lasting relationships for acquaintance, friendship, companionship, romance, and can even lead to a permanent commitment.

A Christian online dating website would include chat rooms where you can have fun discussions. Post memos and notes in message boards. Share pictures with photo galleries. And of course, send personal messages to private mail boxes. They also feature instant messaging and voice introductions for a more personal touch. Some of the Christian websites even offer Christian dating services aside from online matching.

In a Christian online dating site, the center is spirituality. You include faith in your search for a mate. Most people go to a Christian community for dates because they prefer to have somebody within their faith. People here believe, they have filtered out the dates with people who may not share the same set of values.

Mellow people usually belong to this group of online daters. They are those who dislike too much loud music, bar hopping, and disco dancing. Most dates here end in a cozy restaurant or a sweet music place. Although this is not necessarily true all the time, it can be frequently observed on date outcomes based on testimonials.

Dating a stranger sharing your beliefs would be more reassuring than starting with somebody who does not share the same principles. If you are joining a Christian online dating site, you’ll know what you can expect. And as implied, the online society is Christ-centered. And by association, Christ is all pure love and kindness. If you join the group, you are for Christian values and standards. Meeting the love of your life could be a possibility!

1. Island Picnic

If you have the moolah, you can always get travel arrangements and head to a deserted island. A simple picnic on a not-so simple island will give your dating life that spark you have been waiting for. This will be very much appreciated by married couples as well.

2. Food Tripping Date

You don’t have to spend so much if you only going to fast food chains. But it is a lot more fun to go restaurant-hopping to sample each restaurant’s specialties. Don’t forget to skip some food before doing this kind of date, or you’ll end up overweight.

3. Wine Sampling

This could be more enjoyable if you are in a European country where all sorts of wines abound. However, many private wineries are springing up all over the place.  Do your homework and see if you can find a local winery close to your location.  Just make sure that you are not alcohol-intolerant to enjoy this dating idea.

4. Learn Something New

Learning a new skill could be handy.  Learning a new skill with someone else is a surefire way to conjure an exciting mood during the date.

5. Window Shopping

Who says only women could enjoy this kind of date? Even if it is not a first date, as long as the guy also gets to go to the stores he likes visiting, it could be one fun time for the both of you. Also, it can make you both learn each others preferences when it comes to material things.

6. Truth or Dare Date

Pick a place to go to. Then while heading to that area, you can have fun learning about each other’s secrets while playing truth or dare.

7. Sports Date

Go hiking, golfing, mountain-climbing or just about anything that makes you both  tick. This is one of those feel-good date ideas since sports induce the production of that body chemical that makes you feel good.

With these ideas, you will never run out of new and enthralling activities to do. Just be creative.

Meeting people online is similar to having friends doing all the work looking for that special someone. Recently, more people have had higher success rates in getting a date online than the conventional method. 

Here are some interesting benefits to know about online dating;

1. Safety

By personally signing up with an online dating service, the person can meet many people without the risk of revealing one’s personal information. The only time that such details can be revealed will be done voluntarily by the searcher to the potential partner when a level of trust has been established.

2. Security

Dating online is supposed to help people who have difficulty meeting that special someone. Some people take advantage of that and prey on innocent people so most dating sites have made a system that allows one to report a user and have that person blocked for malicious conduct and prevent this from happening to other people.

3. Affordable

Dating people is costly especially since one goes out on more than one date. By getting to know many people online, one will be able to save a lot of money since the  same information that one gathers online can be done just like going out on an actual date.

4. No more rejection and unwanted people

For men, dating online avoids the embarrassing experience of going up to meet a girl and getting rejected. By signing up on an online service and just chatting online, one can easily forget about this person and meet someone new.

For women, dating online helps avoid meeting the wrong person. It saves the person the time and effort of giving love to someone not as deserving as that potential partner.  

5. Openness

Most people find it difficult being honest talking to a stranger because of the fear that they  will not appreciate what is shown. 

Since dating online provides a buffer by talking to someone via the computer and not face to face, another benefit is that one can be as open as one wants to be without fear of showing any sign of emotional attachment.  

Online dating can be fun. Be it just to meet new friends or meet that potential partner.