Elon Musk Takes Aim At Apple, Says That App Store Fee is Like Having a ‘30% Tax on the Internet’

Elon Musk continues to speak his mind without reservation and today he took aim at Apple, decrying a long-standing fee that the App Store charges to app makers.

News outlet Slashdot shared a story about how “PayPal helped spur a formal antitrust complaint against Apple and its iPhone payments system by raising concerns with the European Commission” in a tweet.

Musk took that as a cue to weigh in on the Apple App Store and he didn’t hold back.

“Apple’s store is like having a 30% tax on the Internet. Definitely not ok,” Musk declared in a reply.

In another reply, Musk added, “Literally 10 times higher than it should be,” which means he believes it should be 3 percent.

Literally 10 times higher than it should be

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 3, 2022

A 2020 New York Times article reported that the App Store has been the primary driver of growth in recent years for a company that has nearly $275 billion in annual sales. 

When the App Store had launched 12 years prior, they noted, that it had only 500 offerings and few complained about the fee.

Phillip Shoemaker, a former senior App Store executive, who left Apple in 2016, noted at the time that credit card companies charge roughly 3 percent to process payments.

“I think we’re realizing that 30 percent is way too much… It should be closer to that,” Shoemaker said, which would put his thoughts in line with Musk.