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Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#171

Post by mhneu »

chmod600 wrote: post #166
djur wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A substantial number of those 52 senators oppose free school meals not because they're "too expensive" but because the policy itself (the government giving free food to children) is something they object to on ideological grounds. A much smaller subset of that group also oppose the government giving free stuff to industry, but in either case the cost is not what they're concerned about.

Or, perhaps feel that state governments are better suited to those kinds of assistance programs.

Unlikely, because many states then cut those assistance programs when given the opportunity. It's more likely that the 'state' argument is a way to achieve their ideological ends (cutting the program.)

That said, this bill is a very positive development. Investing in local manufacturing and R&D is a great idea, and it will help the economy. Hopefully it will efficient and money will not be captured by rent-seekers or cronyism.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#172

Post by mwattsun »

We support strategic defense industries [1] in the U.S. so I don't understand how offshoring chip making was ever allowed to happen

[1] As a former sub sailor, I'm aware that we kept submarine building capability afloat at New London, CT and Newport News, VA even when there is no current demand, but this was long ago and may no longer be true

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#173

Post by listless »

mattnewton wrote: post #155
guelo wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

51 senators could change that rule any time though, it’s just an accidental convention that hasn’t had the best track record imo

Nobody changes it because they know they are going to need it when they are the minority. Someone is gonna have to take one for the team and pull the plug on it, but I have little faith in our government ever doing the “principled” thing.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#174

Post by lkbm »

ParksNet wrote: post #39

Banning Proof of Work cryptocurrencies from being traded on licensed exchanges would achieve the same improvement of chip availability, as well as saving a huge amount of electricity, for $0. I guess sensible measures like this don't boost the share portfolios of politicians' spouses though.

If the goal is to increase available supply, this might work. If the goal is to increase domestic production, I don't see how it would help.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#175

Post by themaninthedark »

lazide wrote: post #130
ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Are we going to pretend 737MAX wasn't grounded for a year and half after 2 devastating crashes killing 346 people? I think a world without Boeing would have been clearly better? I seriously think you should consider reading the history of air travel, they don't say "regulations are written down in blood" for no reason. There's been many an accident due to a mechanical fault that's eventually remedied. Its a tragedy…

Big difference between a mechanical fault and what appears to be regulatory capture from a monopolizing entity causing a very sketchy product to be approved in a safety critical role - which then kills a lot of people.

>Big difference between a mechanical fault and what appears to be regulatory capture

You can't call Airbus's design decision to average the inputs a "mechanical fault", somehow that got approved by regulators.

You are damning Airbus with the same attack you are aiming at Boeing.

The 737-MAX crashes are absolutely horrific and how the FAA responded was terrible. The design was shit and should have had better review, same for Airbus and what caused France 447.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#176

Post by ryathal »

Someone1234 wrote: post #129

It should be noted that the US decided not to extend the universal free school meals program, because it was "too expensive" at $11B. They also stopped the expanded and early payment of family tax credits, causing a double-whammy hit to poor families (then pile on inflation/food prices, and gas prices). But $50B to large monopolistic companies isn't "too expensive," and we can afford that . Unfortunately 52 senators…

They only killed universal free lunch, not the means tested part. Poorer kids are still getting free lunches and now the richer families have to pay for school lunches. They ended welfare for the wealthy.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#177

Post by mhneu »

mechagodzilla wrote: post #160
ren_engineer wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

main problem is that we are rewarding companies for being disloyal and offshoring in the first place, now they win again with free money after raking in profits for decades. We should have some funding for smaller companies and R&D but also massive tariffs to force companies to bring manufacturing back

There are basically only 3 close-to-cutting edge foundries left - Intel (American), Samsung (South Korean) and TSMC (Taiwanese), and TSMC is in the lead by quite a bit. We're getting extremely close to the end-game of moore's law, so the lifetime of a <7nm fab is likely to be long, and there are likely to only ever be a handful built because they are absurdly expensive (20+ Billion dollars), particularly if you can't…

This is true for large digital integrated circuits.

There's also analog fabs, MEMS fabs, LED/photo/laser fabs.

Places like Analog still have smaller fabs like that. Those fabs also seem likely to create technological progress into the future, and so the US should be funding those too.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#178

Post by upupandup »

butterfly771 wrote: post #138

As a Chinese, I would like to say that as far as I know, China is investing heavily in semiconductors, but without high-end production equipment, it is difficult to produce high-precision chips

There's a good reason these litography machines and other CNC equipment have GPS sensitive tracking. Even a slight deviation renders the equipment non-operable and dials home immediately if they lose connectivity.

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#179

Post by nceqs3 »

alexb_ wrote: post #148

For your convenience, the text of the bill is here: https://docs.house.gov/billsthisweek/20220725/BILLS-117HR434... . Relevant text for semiconductor funding is on page 10. The bill says "for section 9902/9906 of Public Law 116-283". This can be found on page 1460 here: https://www.congress.gov/116/plaws/publ283/PLAW-116publ283.p...

King!

Re: Senate passes bipartisan bill to subsidize U.S.-made semiconductor chips

#180

Post by bejelentkezni »

mechagodzilla wrote: post #160
ren_engineer wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

main problem is that we are rewarding companies for being disloyal and offshoring in the first place, now they win again with free money after raking in profits for decades. We should have some funding for smaller companies and R&D but also massive tariffs to force companies to bring manufacturing back

There are basically only 3 close-to-cutting edge foundries left - Intel (American), Samsung (South Korean) and TSMC (Taiwanese), and TSMC is in the lead by quite a bit. We're getting extremely close to the end-game of moore's law, so the lifetime of a <7nm fab is likely to be long, and there are likely to only ever be a handful built because they are absurdly expensive (20+ Billion dollars), particularly if you can't…

Unless I'm mistaken, Micron and Texas Instruments have their own foundries as well.
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