The US “Chip Act” is regarding to be passed, and President Biden declared: “The United States invented the chip, and now it’s time to bring it home.” I think of Zhang Wuchang, a famous economic writer in Hong Kong, who wrote a series of articles on property rights in the 1980s. What America is doing today is going backwards.
Do bees have anything to do with apple orchards? Zhang Wuchang talked regarding the analysis of Nobel Laureate in Economics JE Meade in “The Orange Seller’s Words” that the beekeepers let the bees come to the apple orchard to collect honey, but did not pay the owner of the orchard. Is this reasonable? On the other hand, when the bees gather honey, they will spread the pollen of the fruit trees, which will increase the harvest of fruit. Ask a question: “Does the owner of the orchard pay the beekeepers?” Otherwise, it will not benefit the entire ecological cycle, and the society will suffer losses.
The above story is used by Zhang Wu to explain the efficiency and feasibility of the market mechanism. I will not extend it further here. Let’s talk regarding the salmon breeding story in the book. Everyone will understand that there is no such thing as a monopoly on property rights from top to bottom in this world. “Salmon is the fish with the highest market value in the world. This fish is born in freshwater rivers, grows up in the ocean, and can swim to places two or three thousand miles away.” The most amazing thing is that salmon forage in the ocean and survive, three to seven years later You can return to the river where you were born and become the prey of those who keep the hook under the estuary. The question is, how to determine property rights and prices in this complex and tortuous ecosystem? Is it true that the owner of the river where the salmon originates can claim that all the salmon in the world is his? This unreasonable statement is not equivalent to what Biden said, chips were invented in the United States, and all chips must be returned to the birthplace of the United States.
The invention of the chip by the United States is a remarkable achievement in the field of science and technology. However, from the development of the first chip 4004 to 8080 by Intel, to the PC era brewed by x86 and Pentium, and then to the information revolution, it is not the United States that Single-handedly from invention to promotion. Without the application of the global virtual division of labor in the future, and without China, which has a huge market and the ability to innovate in scenarios, the chips originally invented in the United States were at most used to make game consoles. Salmon story, you can draw inferences from one case, you don’t need to ask a few more Nobel laureates in economics to analyze it in detail with you.
It is fair to say that the United States invests in the revitalization of the local semiconductor industry. Today, who would insist on a free market economy and universal price control, compared with the unnecessary disputes of socialism, planned economy and government intervention? Everyone will cite Chinese chief designer Deng Xiaoping’s “white cat and white cat theory”, so the US bill to help build the chip industry should not be obstructed – the bill will provide $52 billion in funding, most of which will be allocated to US chip manufacturers , for them to build factories to produce chip components, etc. The bill also provides a 4-year 25% tax break for U.S. chipmakers, $500 million for international secure communications programs, and $200 million for worker training, among other things—however, the problem is Biden’s” Bringing chips home” is actually the subtext of a complete blockade of China’s semiconductor technology, which is a barbaric method that violates any economic principles and theories.
You said it’s better to send a few copies of “Selling Oranges” to Biden and his team, so that they can learn from the reference and enlighten themselves. I said that it’s scheming. It’s better to give a Cantonese saying: “People who go down the road will be defeated”, so that they can learn something. Be vigilant, more direct and effective.
