Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World Highlight

Steve Jobs lobbied the California legislature and the governor, Jerry Brown, for a bespoke tax credit: 25 percent of the purchase price for every computer donated to schools. In 1983, he offered each of the 9,250 eligible schools in the state an Apple IIe system, and almost all accepted.47 The company’s huge profit margin combined with the offsetting tax credit meant that Apple was paying an estimated 5 percent or less of the ostensible bill—and that’s just what the company said publicly.