I believe you, but one of my basic beliefs is everyone is pushing something. I do not think you will find an intelligent person alive who would argue with the fact that all U.S. publications are inherently biased towards the U.S. That is what I based my comment off of.
IMO, Intel is ahead of China in some ways while it's behind in other ways. As severely critical of Intel as I have been, and I stand behind every word, I absolutely believe in the Intel 18A process. By 2026, Intel has a very good chance of having 18A (1.8nm) dialed in and yielding well enough to be viable. I'm skeptical of their mid 2025 schedule but you never know. The reason Intel isn't talking about 20A (2nm) is because 18A is just as viable. If they can lithograph just as well at the smaller pitch, it doesn't make sense to work on the larger pitch. I'm told they are developing 20A, non commercially, as part of 18A development. Meanwhile, TSMC claims to have their 1.6nm (name, not feature size) process nearing production ready. They are already sending out engineering samples made with their 2nm process, from what I understand. While I have absolutely no data of any kind showing TSMC ahead of Intel with their sub-2nm process, I base my respective confidence on each of them entirely on the reputation and past success. I have no specific data on the TSMC 1.6nm process, other than it exists and they have internal samples backed by a long history of success. Lastly, there seems to be some yield related issues with 3nm process that nobody has fully solved. 3nm production is good enough but not great and that goes for every fab of which I have read. It looks like 2nm will be more reliable than 2 year older 3nm process from early in the 2nm production cycle. So, can Intel catch up? Of course but it won't be easy. Don't forget, making wafers is only the beginning. Intel plans to bump and package 18A wafers internally so those process will also need to be stabilized at that pitch.
I totally agree. Smokie for the win. Instability is poison in global trade. Throwing around tariffs like a beer funnel at a frat party is not the way to do it. I've never said I like how Trump implemented tariffs. What I have said is that I acknowledge tariffs may and probably are necessary, on some level and on some products. Yes, I absolutely think Trump is a clown but I also feel there is a tiny kernel of validity in what he is doing in such brutal fashion.
If you look back at semiconductor history, TSMC was the first company to break out of the G450 consortium and focus on EUV, back in 2015-2016. G450 (450mm wafer production) collapsed, perhaps partially because of reduced support, perhaps partially due to it being a bad decision at the time. I do not claim to understand well enough to portion blame. TSMC has a long history of good decisions. TSMC has technically out performed Intel. How are you going to tariff against that? Even if Intel had also dropped G450 and had a substantial tariff in 2017, they would have been creating 14nm parts while TSMC was making 10nm parts. TSMC parts had better performance and better power efficiency. A tariff won't solve that. This is the situation China is in. China is trying to force use of their own products, and that's a good strategy, but their technology platform is well behind the leading edge in essentially every metric.
Just gonna leave this riiiight here: Trump says Hollywood 'dying'; orders 100% tariff on non-US movies to save it https://www.reuters.com/business/me...tariff-movies-produced-outside-us-2025-05-04/
And one for the white male Boomer crowd: Though I am not a Boomer, I do own LGB, so of course this is on my Youtube feed
I'm still catching up on this thread. Not sure if @StockJock-e mentioned it. The stance of the site has always been it's ok to talk politics as long as the conversation is substantive and not just calling each other idiots with 2-line posts.
My position on tariffs is that they can serve a few purposes, and should be used for those purposes. In industries that we feel are vital to national security, targeted tariffs can be useful to encourage the manufacturing of said goods in our own borders in case we ever need them faster, or even at all if we're in conflict with another country that manufactures those goods. Another time they can be useful is to help transition to - or away - from specific industries that would result in massive economic change. For example, if every auto company in the US decided they're leaving by the end of this decade, there would be a lot of high-paying jobs with good benefits lost, as well as downstream suppliers, etc. that are all out of work with not much of a lateral transition spot. Specific locations in the US would never recover. Tariffs on specific industries or locations can help prevent rapid degradation of areas in the US. There are other times they can be useful. It is not due to trade imbalance. Watch something like Shark Tank and every time someone tells the sharks that they are manufacturing in the US, someone like Kevin O'Leary asks why they are still in the US. I've seen Tom talk about it before too. He's working on some business or something and has said that bringing the part he does in China back to the US would not be at all profitable, even with a 100% tariff. There are certain industries that make no sense to bring back to the US, because other countries can do them more efficiently for the wages they need to be manufactured at to be profitable. Nobody will admit it, but they don't want certain goods to cost more just to be made in America. I don't want to pay $100 to buy a 2-pack of plain white t-shirts I wear under a hoodie or something. Companies will never cut their profit margins, and investors would be pissed if they "did what many view as right" and lowered their profit margins to build in the US, while still making some money, just less. Unlike many, I am massively in favor of American labor, Union jobs, etc. I practice what I preach and in many cases buy what I can from American-owned or American-manufactured companies. I have spent hundreds to thousands more on things I "believe in" which is protecting good paying jobs, even if it means I pay more. I've purchased new vehicles made by UAW members, when I can just get a used foreign car for far cheaper. I've bought American-manufactured brands for lawn mowers for multiple hundred dollar markup compared to the one sitting right next to it. I can do this because I have a good-paying American job, my wife has a very good salary as an ER nurse, and we make sacrifices in certain areas to live our values. So while I'm about as anti-Trump as a person can be, I'm more OK with his tariffs than most "on my side". I've had arguments with my dad in the past about how greedy corporations move production overseas in the name of mass profits for the rich (so you can get an idea on my ideological evolution over the past few years). Now I am largely in favor of the free market, because I've given up on the idea of companies doing what I view(ed) as more ethical (stop offshoring and just make a little less profit, you already make X%, you don't need to make more). I've now modified that view a little and have discovered that maybe it's not horrible to lift other areas of the world up to stabilize them, provide us those goods for cheaper so we can innovate, have less global conflict saving us money, etc. Macro economics is massive, and changing one part of it changes a lot. My issue with the tariffs is the handling of the tariffs, the conflict-implied way they are announced, and the seeming lack of foresight or strategy. The American experiment has been so successful and we've become the greatest country in the world (IMO) because we have great relationships with most countries, they know where we stand, we have alliances, etc. We've been the light on the hilltop for the world to see. They know what they can count on from us. The way the tariffs have been announced and other countries (especially allies) have been talked about will undoubtedly change our relationships with those countries for decades at minimum. At first I figured most countries would just be like "Whatever, he'll be gone soon", but the American people's support has probably shown those countries that there is an appetite for it in the US, so even when Trump's 2nd term is over, they won't know if the America they used to know can be trusted again. There's been reports of nearly all countries looking for other trading partners and lowering reliance on American goods. That means the things we still do assemble and export will have less demand worldwide, meaning the little bit of manufacturing we still have is now at jeopardy, probably permanently. The biggest issue to me is our global position as leader. The biggest issue to me isn't the few remaining months of tariffs before our supply of goods dries up and people can't afford them anymore, but the lasting damage worldwide. When you basically emit to the world that you no longer want to be the global leader, someone else will fill that void. Will America still be the world's greatest country with the most power and the most money and the most comfortable lives for the citizens in a decade or two if our relationships with our trading partners isn't repaired? This could all end up being next to nothing, or it could be the end of American hegemony. The risk-reward to me is not there at all for an already thriving country.
To add to the confusion about how these trade deals are being implemented or what "process" there may/may not be regarding them. The president responding to some questions about these "deals." On Sunday aboard Air Force One, Trump said there “could very well be” trade deals announced this week. “We’re negotiating with many countries but at the end of this I’ll set my own deals because I set the deal, they don’t set the deal, I set the deal,” he told reporters Sunday. “This is not like a big deal that’s gonna be signed — in some cases we’ll sign them, but we don’t have to sign them. I’ll be setting the deal, I’ll be setting the tariff.” To me, this makes absolutely no sense. This almost sounds like some weak MOU type stuff. Maybe that is what they want, something that can be basically not enforced, but touted as some sort of accomplishment. I suppose from the comments above, we could get to the end of it and the administration just announces a flat rate or varying rates for countries. Trade agreements take time, much longer than what has been described since the start of this whole ordeal. To think that they can deliver 100 or whatever number is floated out weekly, was not even believable in the beginning. I'm beginning to think the whole shebang may end up being an agreement scribbled out on a big chief tablet with crayon. If they truly believe this is how the process works, then yes it is a disaster performance. The other possibility is they know it themselves and it is all for fluff and show, which makes it almost as short sighted as the other.
