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I love how “we can’t make chips in the US anymore it’s impossible” was something we heard only a few years ago.

by nailer 4y ago

squintychino 4y ago
I mean, that's true. If the 'we' is American companies. They had to bring one in from another country to manufacture here. We stopped being a manufacturing country decades ago.
lazyeye 4y ago
Yes I thought advocating for bringing manufacturing back onshore meant you were an economic illiterate and a xenophobe. I guess that was before supply-chain security became important and the only consequence was the people that dont matter losing their jobs.
- mrtksn 4y ago
  It's also impossible to bring back horses as main vehicle of transportation until you have a civilisation collapse and can't viably produce machinery and fuel in large scale. I find it unfortunate that we are going back into a partitioned world but let's hope it brings competing ideas at least. I'm even a bit excited about it, as long as it stays a cold war and doesn't turn into WW3 and stays as a competition in everything like during the cold war.
  - vineyardmike 4y ago
    > It's also impossible to bring back horses as main vehicle of transportation until you have a civilisation collapse That’s a bad read of the situation. It’s not like no one makes chips. The reasons people cite for why manufacturers don’t come to America are largely political. The reality is that manufacturing is alive and well but those with industry knowledge aren’t American, and America has most left low margin and high labor manufacturing not all manufacturing. In this case, America is literally paying the Taiwanese to bring their knowledge to America. Is the world collapsing? No one knows but this can be more easily seen as “vertical integration” of a national economy. No one said Samsung was doomed when apple made their own mobile chips, and there’s no reason that the global economy is doomed just because the richest and most powerful economy in the world wanted a strategically important, high margin business.
    - mrtksn 4y ago
      I'm speaking about manufacturing in general, I don't think that anybody said that high margin and high tech manufacturing can't be done in the west - stuff like chip manufacturing never left the USA, they simply fell behind.
deltaseventhree 4y ago
It's possible. With subsidies. The US is literally paying tsmc for this to even be viable. Tsmc is not coming here because it's an economically wise move. They are coming here knowing it's an economically irrational move. Politics is the reason for this move. It is not a clear cut win. Your post has the aroma of patriotism. Patriotism blinds us to harsh truths. Why do you love how people were wrong when they said we can't make chips in the US anymore? You shouldn't feel love or hate for any of these statements.
- quantumwannabe 4y ago
  Your post has an enormous aroma of patriotism. Where were you when Taiwan was subsidizing TSMC? They were only able to outcompete Western fabs due to the enormous amount of government help they got in the early days. Those Taiwanese leaders sure were stupid to have invested in chip manufacturing.
  - deltaseventhree 4y ago
    Patriotism for America at best. I'm American. Just not biased. Patriotism is a form of bias. When you have none you see the truth more clearly. Taiwan subsidized tsmc for tech. Once the tech was established the subsidy ended. Right now the US is subsidizing tsmc for simply switching locations. Once the location is switched the economic output of this plant will be negative so the subsidies have to remain. The US chip market is not capable of making competitive chips. Not without economic assistance. This is categoric fact.
- HDThoreaun 4y ago
  > Tsmc is not coming here because it's an economically wise move. No, it's an economically wise move because of the politics. This plant allows TSMC to gets the CHIPS subsidy, but maybe more importantly it allows them to become part of the military industrial complex which requires that products are made domestically. This fab will print money.
  - deltaseventhree 4y ago
topspin 4y ago
The regression so far: - TSMC will never build-out in the US - And if they do it will only be older nodes - And if it's not just old nodes then it's only because subsidies. Now that it's actually happening we see cop outs, like "yeah but ?nm will be obsolete by the time it's built."

I love how “we can’t make chips in the US anymore it’s impossible” was something we heard only a few years ago.

by nailer 4y ago

I love how “we can’t make chips in the US anymore it’s impossible” was something we heard only a few years ago.

I mean, that's true. If the 'we' is American companies. They had to bring one in from another country to manufacture here. We stopped being a manufacturing country decades ago.

lazyeye 4y ago

Yes I thought advocating for bringing manufacturing back onshore meant you were an economic illiterate and a xenophobe. I guess that was before supply-chain security became important and the only consequence was the people that dont matter losing their jobs.

mrtksn 4y ago
It's also impossible to bring back horses as main vehicle of transportation until you have a civilisation collapse and can't viably produce machinery and fuel in large scale. I find it unfortunate that we are going back into a partitioned world but let's hope it brings competing ideas at least. I'm even a bit excited about it, as long as it stays a cold war and doesn't turn into WW3 and stays as a competition in everything like during the cold war.
- vineyardmike 4y ago
  > It's also impossible to bring back horses as main vehicle of transportation until you have a civilisation collapse That’s a bad read of the situation. It’s not like no one makes chips. The reasons people cite for why manufacturers don’t come to America are largely political. The reality is that manufacturing is alive and well but those with industry knowledge aren’t American, and America has most left low margin and high labor manufacturing not all manufacturing. In this case, America is literally paying the Taiwanese to bring their knowledge to America. Is the world collapsing? No one knows but this can be more easily seen as “vertical integration” of a national economy. No one said Samsung was doomed when apple made their own mobile chips, and there’s no reason that the global economy is doomed just because the richest and most powerful economy in the world wanted a strategically important, high margin business.
  - mrtksn 4y ago
    I'm speaking about manufacturing in general, I don't think that anybody said that high margin and high tech manufacturing can't be done in the west - stuff like chip manufacturing never left the USA, they simply fell behind.

deltaseventhree 4y ago

It's possible. With subsidies. The US is literally paying tsmc for this to even be viable. Tsmc is not coming here because it's an economically wise move. They are coming here knowing it's an economically irrational move. Politics is the reason for this move. It is not a clear cut win. Your post has the aroma of patriotism. Patriotism blinds us to harsh truths. Why do you love how people were wrong when they said we can't make chips in the US anymore? You shouldn't feel love or hate for any of these statements.

quantumwannabe 4y ago
Your post has an enormous aroma of patriotism. Where were you when Taiwan was subsidizing TSMC? They were only able to outcompete Western fabs due to the enormous amount of government help they got in the early days. Those Taiwanese leaders sure were stupid to have invested in chip manufacturing.
- deltaseventhree 4y ago
  Patriotism for America at best. I'm American. Just not biased. Patriotism is a form of bias. When you have none you see the truth more clearly. Taiwan subsidized tsmc for tech. Once the tech was established the subsidy ended. Right now the US is subsidizing tsmc for simply switching locations. Once the location is switched the economic output of this plant will be negative so the subsidies have to remain. The US chip market is not capable of making competitive chips. Not without economic assistance. This is categoric fact.
HDThoreaun 4y ago
> Tsmc is not coming here because it's an economically wise move. No, it's an economically wise move because of the politics. This plant allows TSMC to gets the CHIPS subsidy, but maybe more importantly it allows them to become part of the military industrial complex which requires that products are made domestically. This fab will print money.
- deltaseventhree 4y ago

topspin 4y ago

The regression so far: - TSMC will never build-out in the US - And if they do it will only be older nodes - And if it's not just old nodes then it's only because subsidies. Now that it's actually happening we see cop outs, like "yeah but ?nm will be obsolete by the time it's built."