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by WebbWeaver 1420 days ago
Can we not frame this as a battle or even a war? The US lost this capability a long time ago due to labor costs and natural resource consumption.

From the labor cost and natural resource consumption a operation of this size can easily fail. We need more partners in this not just a handout.

This action should have little to no input on any globalized leverage system.

For this to be successful we need more partners
3 comments
djmips 1419 days ago
Can someone else corroborate that is something the US lost because of labor costs? We are constantly told it's R&D and infrastructure costs. How much of that is labor costs?

It almost feels like labor costs is a good story to salve the ego when the US was simply beat on tech and tech investment.

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simonh 1419 days ago
"Lost this capability"?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_semiconductor_fabricat...

90 plants in the US, of which 5 have been built or under construction within the last 5 years. That's the same number of new fabs as Taiwan, China and Japan.

It is true that Taiwan has the technical lead at the moment, but that's a very recent development, yet everyone's talking as though the US hasn't built a chip since the 90s. Most of the strategically most important chips for military and industrial applications aren't at the cutting edge anyway.

It's an important strategic sector, sure, but none of these subsidies will actually address the most advanced tech segment and most of it will disappear as political pork. I mean it's your money, I'm a Brit, but to me this all just seems like absurd posturing.

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onepointsixC 1419 days ago
>We need more partners in this not just a handout.

This rings hollow when all of America's major partners are pumping massive subsidies to their domestic companies to win. Case and point SK is subsidizing their Fabs to the tune of $450 Bn.[1]

[1]: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-13/korea-unv... [1 Non paywalled]: https://archive.ph/9Gs8q

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WebbWeaver 1419 days ago
I did not mean to strike a hollow note. I do not see such vision being applied outside of lets increase competition and spend locally.

How much further will their their money go locally than ours? I want us to spend our money on the next generation but what economic window are we planning to occupy?

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