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Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

nytimes.com

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Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#261

Post by bagels »

nonethewiser wrote: post #227
curiousllama wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having seen a few 'high tech' places myself: there's high tech, and then there's _high tech_. Assembling a motherboard is to semiconductor fabs as flying a toy drone is to landing a Boeing 747. One you can learn in an afternoon; the other takes years to learn.

I think you underestimate the amount of people with high school education doing very precise, skilled work right now. Do you think skilled machines tend to have PHds or even bachelors? Im not saying its as simple as CNC. I am saying that I doubt you need an IQ of 130 or a PHD. Start investing in the people whose labor were undercut. In fact a skilled machinist or technician seems like a much closer match (in terms of…

Skilled machinists?

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#262

Post by aylmao »

transcriptase wrote: post #19
ejb999 wrote: post #16

I just don't get it - the country has over $34 Trillion in debt already and we are handing out money to mega-rich corporations who don't need the money (among other things we waste money on). This is not going to end well - our kids and grand kids will be paying for it.

They would be paying far more if chips suddenly stopped coming out of Taiwan in the future and the U.S. had no onshore capacity to make their own. It’s more of an insurance policy than a subsidy. Intel needs a reason to build in the U.S., and grants tip the ROI scale on their side to make it happen.

> Intel needs a reason to build in the U.S.

I mean, if Intel is only motivated to build in the USA when it gets a fat check rather than out of conviction, I think that's a problem too, no? Does this mean that whenever maximizing (short-term) shareholder value is at odds with national sovereignty the USA will have to hand them out a check?

I don't know that this is what's going on here, perhaps Intel really is committed to the USA beyond the individual gain of its executives and shareholders. It's worth noting though, there's some prominent examples in US history where this hasn't been the case. Banks for example got really rich at the USA's expense in the years leading to 2008.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#263

Post by Nifty3929 »

$8.5 in corporate welfare, out of a total of $39B that "Biden has to spend." - That's about $100 per person in the US. How about just give us each $100 instead, and we can vote with those Dollars for what we want? Maybe we'd rather invest it in food, clothes, shelter, transportation, etc.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#264

Post by bombcar »

happytiger wrote: post #142
icyfox wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The text of the bill [^1] disagrees with this: > In awarding financial assistance for planning or establishing a Manufacturing USA Institute, an agency shall give special consideration to such institutes that > contribute to the geographic diversity of the Manufacturing USA program, > are located in an area with a low per capita income, > are located in an area with a high proportion of socially disadvantaged residen…

Oh yes, the bill has all kinds of nice ideas in it. But then there is reality. And reality is that there isn’t some giant labor pool of fab workers in the US — yet. - President Joe Biden signed the CHIPS and Science Act into law one year ago, and semiconductor companies across the U.S. have promised to spend $231 billion on building chip manufacturing hubs on American soil. - Now, as the shovels hit the ground to beg…

Whatcha talking about? My small rural area is full of unemployed semiconductor engineers ;)

(Though it could be - if you can wait 20 years you could home grow it)

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#265

Post by bombcar »

count wrote: post #191
eitally wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy this for a minute. It's very easy to train people to work in factories and there are lots of Americans willing to do it if the pay is right. These companies are just complaining so they can get more federal handouts to offset the higher labor costs of onshoring.

These are not those kinds of factories, and it's not 'easy' to train for. And Americans are surely WILLING to do the work, but have no idea how. If it was so goddamned easy to build a chip fab, they'd be all over the place - everybody needs them, and they're extremely strategic.

Is it that the work is impossibly skilled or that there’s only so much demand to go around and the capital costs to build a state of the art fab is just astronomically high?

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#266

Post by bumby »

hollywood_court wrote: post #108
icyfox wrote: post #79

Right now one of the biggest blockers in on-shoring semiconductor fab at any kind of reasonable price-point and timescale is the lack of a skilled workforce. This legislation has dual objectives: train new people to get into sophisticated manufacturing AND to build out the actual infrastructure itself. That almost guarantees it won't be the most efficient way to actually get these chips on American soil. Whether we l…

I imagine we’d have that skilled workforce if companies paid enough. I’m a former construction contractor who reinvented myself as a software developer. Each time I run into one of my former peers in the construction industry I hear the same complaints from them. “We can’t hire any good help.” Yet they are still paying the same non living wages that they have for 30 years.

Not saying this with snark, but how many of those former peers work for companies with a clear pipeline to train people? Usually when I hear complaints like "We can't hire or keep good help" it's correlated with a company who isn't willing to invest in developing their workforce.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#267

Post by Nifty3929 »

dietmtnview wrote: post #246
aylmao wrote: post #243

I'm a foreigner native to one of the many nations where American influence led to the sale of sate enterprises, free trade, market liberalization, and overall loss of local companies to the hands of USA firms It's wild to see the same thing happen to the USA now, and to see their government be the ones handing out taxpayer money and caring about national sovereignty over liberalization and "market efficiency".

As a US citizen, it's pretty wild to live through. Socialism for the rich, rugged individualism for the rest of us.

Unfortunately no, it's socialism for us too - just the wrong end of it. The government and their friends are the socialism winners, the rest of us are the socialism losers.

But we do it to ourselves at the ballot box every time, and very reliably.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#268

Post by tgma »

Nifty3929 wrote: post #263

$8.5 in corporate welfare, out of a total of $39B that "Biden has to spend." - That's about $100 per person in the US. How about just give us each $100 instead, and we can vote with those Dollars for what we want? Maybe we'd rather invest it in food, clothes, shelter, transportation, etc.

I suppose at least the theory is $100/person invested in chips will collectively benefit us more as we will not lose the strategic advantage in chipmaking. Surgical planned economy to cover the gaps in market economy and tragedy of the commons situations.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#269

Post by rhelz »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #254
mfer wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This award isn't about innovation, the best way to do things, or job requirements. This about supply chain security and national defense. So many of our components are made overseas and under governments who are not close allies. This is in order to operate things in our country. When you have the FABs in the US and under US control you can handle international foreign policy and the security of the nation differentl…

Fair enough. But then the question is: How did this happen in the first place? If the Pentagon is playing out scenerio after scenerio after scenerio, how did we allow ourselves to be so embarrassingly venerable? And now the taxpayer is on the hook for $8.5B and growing? There's a certain smell to all this.

> How did this happen in the first place?

By not pursuing protectionist public policies.

> the taxpayer is on the hook for $8.5B

$8.5B is a big price tag, but whether the government should spend it or not depends on whether or not the investment pays off.

Re: Intel to Receive $8.5B in Grants to Build Chip Plants

#270

Post by tgma »

randerson wrote: post #115

Intel could have funded this themselves many times over if they'd reinvested their profits instead of paying huge buybacks and dividends.

Intel could have (and has) funded building fabs themselves, but if we are advocating for a free market solution, why would they build it in the US vs somewhere cheaper? Forcing their hand to do it inside the US does not seem like a fair free market solution either. There has to be either a carrot (subsidy), or a stick (tarriffs and embargoes) to nudge them to bring it back home; neither is a clean free-market solution. The additional money is to bridge the gap and cover the unfavorable conditions for conducting the business in the US.
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