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Planning is not doing. Subsidies are only useful if fabs are on the verge of being built, but are being held back. If no one would ever build a fab in the US, t
by syrrim 4y ago
Planning is not doing. Subsidies are only useful if fabs are on the verge of being built, but are being held back. If no one would ever build a fab in the US, then any subsidies handed out will be wasted. If fabs are being built anyways, then there isn't much benefit. Samsung is saying they might build a fab, and thus could be enticed by subsidies.
- b112 4y agoTheir actions say otherwise, because to plan means you think it worthwhile.
- PretzelPirate 4y agoUnless their plan is “let’s get permissions so that if the subsidy is put in place, we’re ready to build.” That doesn’t suggest that they’d build without the subsidy, but that they want to be able to take advantage of the subsidy right away, if it gets put in place.
- b112 4y agoRight. So spend time designing plants specific to local build codes, environment and terrain, paying architechs, examining land conditions, paying legal and lawyers, all to get permits to build, when you can wait until after, and do the same?! Sure, companies love to spend hundreds of thousands on unknowns, for no real reason.
- stevage 4y agoHundreds of thousands out of a possible expenditure in the tens of billions is literally nothing.
- b112 4y agoBy that logic, why don't they just gove me, or you, 500k right now? Hmm? Why not? Because any company behaving that way, would be bankrupt in a year. 500k is nothing on terms of overall expenditures, but companies drool over cutting production costs by .1 cents, here and there. Because it adds up! Because spending 500k for Silly Reasons, done over and over, means profit disappears. 500k is nothing to waste. $1 is nothing to waste. The arguments in this thread are bizarre. They boil down to Samsung spending cash, just in case subsidies appear. Yet there is no difference in terms of getting a subsidy, if they do the work before, or after it becomes law! None! No difference! If there was, everyone would be doing it. So I am expected to believe, Samsung is spending loads of cash, because maybe a bill might be passed, sorta possibly hopefully?! Where instead, they could wait until the bill is passed, and spend the cash for a guaranteed return. Competent companies don't spend money this way. Especially, they don't posture that they are ready to build, when there is no subsidy in place, and may never be one! Is everyone here a Samsung fan or some such? Totally bizarre logic.
- jsweojtj 4y agoThere could be a time advantage, where the probability weighted expected benefits of starting N years ahead of time is much larger than the sum spent preparing. You could think of it as purchasing an option, which businesses definitely do.
- naniwaduni 4y agoCompanies spend hundreds of thousands on unknowns that don't pan out all the time. Sometimes their reasons are even pretty good!
- turns0ut 4y agoThey could officially ask, to lend weight to passing the bill, it passes, take money, never build. See Wisconsin and Foxconn.
- chii 4y ago> Samsung is saying they might build a fab, and thus could be enticed by subsidies. but then if they might build, subsidies are already not required. Subsidies isn't meant to "push plan over the edge" for something. To me, subsidies are meant to encourage fabs when it would not actually have been built - that is, it's a transfer of some wealth to the corporation building it, in exchange for some other social benefit (such as self-sufficiency, or redundancy of manufacturing).