> The US CHIPS and Science Act's future may depend on the outcome of Tuesday's Presidential Election after House Speaker Mike Johnson suggested the GOP would likely move to repeal the $280 billion funding bill if the party wins a majority in Congress.
* https://www.theregister.com/2024/11/04/chips_act_repeal/
but a little while later:
> Johnson, who voted against the legislation, later said in a statement that the CHIPS Act, which poured $54 billion into the semiconductor manufacturing industry, “is not on the agenda for repeal.”
* https://apnews.com/article/mike-johnson-chips-act-d5504f76d3...
so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Wasn't it Trump who popularized the pullback of Chip manufacturing to the US for security ad prosperity reasons.
And how's that Foxconn factory going?
* https://www.reuters.com/business/foxconn-sharply-scales-back...
https://www.jsonline.com/story/money/business/2023/03/23/wha...
> We put up billions of dollars for rich companies to come in and borrow the money and build chip companies here, and they’re not going to give us the good companies anyway.
and
> When I see us paying a lot of money to have people build chips, that’s not the way. You didn’t have to put up 10 cents, you could have done it with a series of tariffs. In other words, you tariff it so high that they will come and build their chip companies for nothing.
That really doesn't sound like it is something he'd just do some minor tweaks to and change the name like he did with NAFTA.
If he does go through with the large tariff approach, something to keep in mind is that usually when you impose tariffs on imports there are retaliatory tariffs imposed on your exports. The US chip making industry makes 82% of its sales from exports.
Sen. Bill Hagerty is in the running for Commerce Secretary (Commerce is the department that runs the CHIPS Act), and he crossed the aisle on a number of semiconductor related legislation.
I'm a huge fan of the CHIPS Act, but most Americans have not heard of it [0].
That lack of noteriety is what protects it.
Doesn't hurt that most deal flow is in purple districts, so most shit-slingers tend to be far removed and shut up pretty quickly after a quick rebuke from Party Chairs about how close the election is.
[0] - https://www.politico.com/f/?id=0000018f-3fe4-dc61-adff-7fe53...
Same reason why Brandon Williams quickly shut up Mike Johnson even though Mike Johnson could make his life in the GOP and the House hell (not all offices in the CBO have air conditioning despite hellish humidity) - he'd rather keep his seat (NY-22) even if it meant undermining his boss.
It does seem like politics at the presidency now is less about what you'll do and more about undoing everything the other side did during their time in office, regardless of utility or popularity of what it is.
Is it me or is this worse now? Had it always been like that and I'm just now seeing it?
Not that the Dems don't undo things... But they add to policy as well.
GOP does culture war, tear stuff down mostly.
Not a fan of the GOP, but industry is operating on the assumption that most industrial policies under the Biden admin will continue to remain.
There's been a lot of policy research and lobbying on this front for over a year at this point [0]
Doesn't hurt that a number of major Trump-Vance donors have benefited from these industrial policies as well.
Sadly, most deal flow is anyhow locked up because the Commerce has been slow at disbursing funds due to bipartisan politicking (eg. GOP trying to undermine the CHIPS act due to pettiness, CPC affiliates trying to launch unnecessary NEPA and Labor fights)
That said, even companies knew that would happen - and a lot of deal flow was strategically placed in purple districts for that reason.
Foreign automakers and their supppliers used a similar strategy in the 1990s-2000s when entering the US market by opening factories in then-Purple Tennessee, Kentucky, WV, etc.
[0] - https://www.eiu.com/n/us-election-its-impact-on-industrial-p...
Donald Norcross in the Labor Caucus has been a major blocker as well because most of these CHIPS projects are being built independent of AFL-CIO in a lot of cases.
China has hundreds going on thousands of ICBMs. Nobody is creating redundancy from Boise to Albany and Sunnyvale to increase survivability in case of a nuclear exchange between America and China.
Uh, lol?
https://thebulletin.org/premium/2024-01/chinese-nuclear-weap...
Sorry, I should have said hundreds going on a thousand. Glad we put that fab in Sunnyvale!
(442 is hundreds. Your own source says the "Pentagon also estimates that China’s arsenal will increase to about 1,000 warheads by 2030, many of which will probably be 'deployed at higher readiness levels' and most 'fielded on systems capable of ranging the [continental United States]'." By 2035 that could grow up to 1,500. These are MAD figures.)
https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/why-on-earth-does-trump-want-t...
Similar situation with the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) - it was opposed not on its merits, but because it was from the opposing side.
That is not accurate:
> Not only were Republican senators deeply involved in the process up until its conclusion, but it's a cinch that the ACA might have become law months earlier if the Democrats, hoping for a bipartisan bill, hadn't spent enormous time and effort wooing GOP senators — only to find themselves gulled by false promises of cooperation. And unlike Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's semi-secret proceedings that involved only a handful of trusted colleagues, Obamacare, until the very end of the process, was open to public scrutiny.
* https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/08/01/set-health...
As in, "we have a majority so we drive the political clown-car. "
> We feel a tap on our shoulder and we look back, and who is it? It's the Republicans. And they say "Huh, excuse me, we'd like the keys back." And we have to tell them "I'm sorry, you can't have the keys back if you don't know how to drive". If you want you can ride with us but you have to ride in the back seat.
Further context: Oct. 22, 2010, in Las Vegas on behalf of Sen. Harry Reid's re-election campaign.
As a sibling comment notes: the Democrats had the majority at the time and were in charge of setting the agenda ("had the keys").
Further, Obama was willing to give the GOP a (figurative) ride if they wanted and were heading in the same direction.
The counter-argument (FWIW):
> Tariffs are paid by the importer and not the exporter. The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) claims that tariffs would not cause fabs to be built in the US, due to the cost of the factories, which can run from $18bn to $27bn.
> "No tariff amount will equal the costs of ripping apart these investments and efficient supply chains that have enabled current US industry leadership," SIA said.
> It added: "Moreover, chip tariffs will drive away manufacturing in advanced sectors that rely on semiconductor technology, such as aerospace, AI, robotics, next-generation networks, and autonomous vehicles. If the cost of key inputs like semiconductors is too high, tech manufacturers will relocate out of the US, costing jobs and further eroding US manufacturing and technological competitiveness."
* https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/trump-bashes-chip...
Foreign chipmakers would not pay the tariff (contrary to what Trump thinks) but their US customers, and what incentive to the foreign chipmakers to make changes? They're getting the same money and it's not costing them a dime. And where else are US businesses going to go for the product?
But customers don't buy chips, they buy stuff, and chips are in everything. There's the obvious (phones, tablets etc), but also everything else, like cars, washing machines, tvs, air fryers, plus more.
Clearly tarrifs drive (domestic) prices up, which will cause some level of inflation, but it will be across the board (not on "chips"). And clearly that will weaken demand.
But given global demand that will likely not be all that noticeable. Indeed it'll likely just result in US manufacturing being less competitive. Certainly it'll make US manufactured products more expensive on the world market.
Which likely leads to more American plants moving offshore, not onshore.
So the higher cost of cars—because they have chips in them that cost more and that is passed onto drivers—will stop people from buying cars?
The higher cost of microwaves will stop people from buying microwaves? And stop buying stoves? And refrigerators?
People will buy fewer smartphones? Businesses will buy fewer laptops and servers?
If the hike is bad enough we might see a return to kitchen electrics that don't use microcontrollers at all. Unironically good news if you want physical buttons again.
I'm arguing there are items that are less elastic when it comes to prices:
* https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/priceelasticity.asp
Someone lives in the US, which is addicted to sprawling, car-centric suburbs. Car prices go up. What are they going to do? Walk? Bike? Take public transit? (Which is one of the arguments for (so-called) 15 minutes cities: it gives people more freedom to choose their mode of transportation instead of forcing one particular mode.)
Are you not going to buy a refrigerator when yours break down and food starts going bad?
While they can stretch out the depreciation/lifespan schedule, are business going to stop buying laptops and servers? If their (capex) costs go up, are the businesses going to eat that cost or pass it on to their customers?
You can't be using the trade association's comment at face-value. Tariffs have absolutely caused factories to be build elsewhere (see car manufacturing) although where a chip site appears in the US or Mexico/Canada (NAFTA) is very arguable.
They just waste some energy on suboptimal chips and business decisions.
He doesn't want to actually improve america, he just wants fox news to pay attention to him 24 hours a day
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CHIPS_and_Science_Act
SiC transistors and diodes are used in high power applications like locomotives, EV chargers and industrial motor controls. In their catalog they have a half-bridge power module rated for 1200V and 760A, which to me is amazing that a semiconductor can handle that much.
https://www.wolfspeed.com/products/power/sic-power-modules/h...
i'm also equally amazed at how much <5v can accomplish. 3.3v is common, but I also think back to the old NTSC video signal was 1v peak-to-peak. Of course, that was just the signal and not the voltage driving the CRT, but still impressive. I've done my own hobby electronics ala Arduino type stuff, and detecting voltage drops in analog of <1v can be challenging to do accurately.
(1V drop, though should be easy to measure. A badly noisy ADC would be at about 10mV. High-precision in analog starts at 10s of uV)
Detecting 1-volt voltage drops is not at all difficult; that's enough to turn on any BJT, and any random opamp can measure voltage differences down to millivolts, often nanovolts. https://www.diodes.com/assets/Datasheets/AS321.pdf is a 50¢ random opamp, the one Digi-Key has the most in stock of at the moment; its offset voltage is specified as 5 millivolts max, but of course it can measure much smaller voltages than that if you null out the offset with a trimpot, or if you just don't care about it.
This is not Arduino's strong point, but it doesn't have any difficulty with that task either. The ADC in the ATMega328P used in most Arduinos has a resolution of about a millivolt when referenced to its internal bandgap https://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/Atmel-7810-..., and it also has an analog comparator with a maximum offset voltage specified as 40 millivolts. And any random cheap-shit multimeter can measure down to a millivolt or so. And, from the discussion above about audio line levels, it should be obvious that just about any dynamic speaker, and most headphones, can easily make millivolt-level signals audible.
Maybe you meant "detecting voltage drops in analog of <1 microvolt can be challenging".
There should be no such thing as free grants, if anything they should be ownership stakes by the U.S. people by way of the government if, e.g., we are handing them 700 Million dollars and then basically deferring on 1 Billion dollars which also has an additional opportunity cost and a cost of the money, i.e., inflation and interest.
I can’t tell you how many people have become extremely wealthy from nothing by getting government grants and contracts that built and funded their companies, paid for by you, with your tax money and inflation you pay at the grocery store.
Let's not push that one too far, there is no "little guy" in these deals.
What does surprise me more is that we don't see "tax credits" in "pay your tax in shares". The amount would be higher then, probably - but many of these deals would in the end be profitable.
Public ownership of shares can be good too. That's a social wealth fund, but we have Vanguard and mutual funds instead.
I'm not understanding correctly (not kidding): what gave the USD its value before the income tax in 1914 or thereabout?
how dumping money onto those parasites solves the problem of the Chinese blocking the chips? So far it looks like :
1. dump the [boatload of uncountable government] money onto the parasites
2. ...
3. chips!
> There should be no such thing as free grants, if anything they should be ownership stakes by the U.S. people by way of the government
What the government would have to do is increase corporate taxes and capital gains taxes but give various writeoffs and rebates for R & D and new factories. Essentially the government tells the corporation, "you can pay us this tax money, or you can put the money back into R & D and production starts, it's up to you."
This would probably upset the Milton Friedman neoliberalism proponents, but they've made a mess of things IMO. Regardless the shareholders and executives would have to take significant losses relative to their present situation under such new conditions. The money has to come from somewhere and fabs are expensive complicated beasts with demanding supply chain issues.
What same people? The ones who messed up US chips are Intel and the article doesn't show them getting any money. Theoretical neoliberals aren't really relevant here. China did not take the chip fab business - this isn't a deindustrialization issue.
(I believe deindustrialization was mostly Volcker and the 70s oil shock though, not the neoliberals.)
> I can’t tell you how many people have become extremely wealthy from nothing
Not to be rude, but you haven't told us that, that is true. The most important thing to remember here is that economic populism is wrong and you should never believe anything you hear like this because it's probably just made up.
Also, grocery prices are fine.
The same people? Decades later?
OR perhaps is new, younger people with better ideas who just happen to work at the same company?
For scale comparison I checked TSMC and they will spend ~$35B in R&D and capex in 2024 and it will only grow.
And the others, who don't want - because they can't. For some globalisation is a navel, a lifeline without which there countries economies would wither and die. The exact same layout pre-WW2.
This will be a big shift in power, and become a more inward focus globally.
If Trump starts more trade wars, we will all be worse off.
The fueling of war in Ukraine and Middle East (Israel vs other countries) is already as bad as it gets.
It is ridiculous to have a military, for example, depend upon supplies which may be cut off during conflict.
It is also ridiculous to have your entire economy dependent upon foreign powers which seek to subvert and destabilize you.
The US and most of the West undertook plans to "uplift" countries such as China in the 70s. The thought was that by opening up trade, prosperity would follow, a middle class would follow, an upper class, and democratic principles might follow.
This had not entirely failed, but at the same time that experiment has been taken too far, especially during the current climate.
Most specifically, China's refusal to sign on to a key, pivotal aspect of access to western markets, IP, eg copyright and patent law, means that their access to these markets is slowly being withdrawn.
What we granted 50 years ago, open, mostly tariff free access to our markets is being taken away, removed as conditions for that access are not being respected.
Only China is to blame for this. The rampant IP theft, the lack of respect for the collective market's rules, the flagrant and egregious espionage, have resulted in this fate.
The West will still trade with anyone that follows such common market principles. The West is not closing down international trade. The West is instead ensuring that when we completely cut off China, and its lack of regard for our common market rules, that we are not harmed.
Thinking this is all about a reduction in trade is wrong.
None of this new, or a surprise to anyone paying attention to geopolitical issues during the last 50 years. When the markets opened, when tariffs were dropped, China was told the rules for that access.
In the ensuing decades, attempts to negotiate and work with China over IP issues have seen zero progress.
We offer access with open hands under specific terms. We happily wanted to engage in profitable business ventures. China, its leadership perhaps thinking it is clever and somehow tricking us, did not realize that the West is very open, forgiving, and willing to discuss a lot prior to hitting an impasse. We believe in democratic principles after all, and try to negotiate.
But now that this next segment of the process has started, China has effectively shot itself in the foot. Like a noisy person repeatedly warned in a movie theater, it is being shown the door.
Access to our market is being withdrawn for China.
Expect this to hit the next level in perhaps 5 years, where all imports hit heavy tariffs... after we've ensured our stability in key areas.
Gradual increases in Chinese import tariffs will ensure local businesses spring up, replacing what will become more expensive Chinese alternatives.
It will be an economic boom for the West.
You can't run a massive trade surplus against USA, gouging their industries while simultaneously calling for the "fall of Westen hegemony" forever. "The Global South" had a chance for the last 20 years to peacefully rise up into the Liberal International Order, they blew it all for the sake their own pride and greed. When any sort of adherence of rules or frameworks is labelled as "imperialism" then unfortunately we'll all have to go back and suffer the 1920s to understand why those rules exist again.