Apple, the world's most valuable company, also has long been one of the greatest cash hoarders. The iPhone and iPad maker, embarrassed by its hoard of almost US$100 billion, decided this week to change perceptions by paying its first dividend in 17 years. It is hardly an innovative way to offload a mountain of cash, but shareholders are naturally happy and there is a sense that at last the firm will start to act in a more equitable way. If its board truly has a conscience, it should next reward its contracted workers in China.

The US$45 billion in dividends over three years and US$10 billion in share buybacks announced by chief executive Tim Cook was an obvious way to deal with what he said earlier this year was 'more than we need to run a company'. With the launch on March 7 of the third generation of the wildly popular iPad, the cash on Apple's balance sheet is further ballooning. Despite the soaring wealth, though, the company has a culture of being tight-fisted. Breaking with that has been difficult, given the god-like status it affords its late co-founder Steve Jobs, whose obsession with stashing away was grounded in the company's near-bankruptcy in the mid-1990s before he rejoined.

Jobs' clever marketing of a string of innovatively designed products pulled Apple out from the doldrums. It surpassed the landmark US$500 billion market capitalisation level last month and climbed past Exxon Mobil to reach the top of the global tree in terms of value. Shareholders should expect, and have a right to, a return for their investment. But the Chinese working for Apple's dozens of contracting firms, the best known among them Foxconn, also deserve a share.