Friday, May 24th 2024
Biden Administration to Revive Trump-Era Tariffs on China-made GPUs and Motherboards
The US Trade Representative (USTR) under Biden administration is preparing to reinstate tariffs on certain technology products imported from China, including GPUs and motherboards. The 25% duties, initially imposed by the Trump administration in 2019 but later suspended, are being revived as part of broader efforts to address concerns over China's economic and trade practices. The tariffs are intended to protect American companies from what the administration describes as unfair Chinese trade actions like intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers that undermine U.S. competitiveness. While no specific effective date was provided, the reinstated tariffs are expected to impact major Chinese computing component suppliers significantly. The revival of the Trump-era tariffs marks a reversal from the previous administration's move to temporarily suspend the duties in 2020 as a goodwill gesture during broader trade negotiations with Beijing.
However, those talks ultimately stalled amid the COVID-19 pandemic and rising bilateral tensions over economic and national security issues. Industry groups have expressed concerns that reviving the tariffs could disrupt tech supply chains, increase costs for U.S. companies and consumers, and potentially invite further Chinese retaliation. The tariffs would apply to GPUs, motherboards and other computing components assembled in China regardless of whether the raw components themselves originated from the country. With tensions already elevated over issues like Taiwan and advanced semiconductor production, the tariff announcement could set the stage for further economic friction between the world's two largest economies absent a negotiated resolution on tech trade.
Sources:
US Trade Representative, via Tom's Hardware
However, those talks ultimately stalled amid the COVID-19 pandemic and rising bilateral tensions over economic and national security issues. Industry groups have expressed concerns that reviving the tariffs could disrupt tech supply chains, increase costs for U.S. companies and consumers, and potentially invite further Chinese retaliation. The tariffs would apply to GPUs, motherboards and other computing components assembled in China regardless of whether the raw components themselves originated from the country. With tensions already elevated over issues like Taiwan and advanced semiconductor production, the tariff announcement could set the stage for further economic friction between the world's two largest economies absent a negotiated resolution on tech trade.
95 Comments on Biden Administration to Revive Trump-Era Tariffs on China-made GPUs and Motherboards
I'm not against moving manufacturing out of China and into allied countries (ex: Korea, Japan, Mexico), or even neutral companies (ex: India, Vietnam, etc. etc.). Its still more expensive as we'd have to rebuild factories that China already has, but it seems worthwhile to me if we ever do get into war vs China.
Alternatively, it removes some bluster China can leverage against us in a future spat. I don't think war is inevitable, I just think war is highly likely. But even in the case of an uneasy peace over the next decade, we know that China will "Wolf-Warrior Dipolmacy" with us and try to bully their way with us and their neighbors.
Ideally, we move all of this manufacturing back home. But you're right, these tariffs don't necessarily accomplish that.
Better think about the EU.
Also, for how long, the companies like VAG and GM did produce the cars for Chinese domestic market, again? There's no way, that the "experience" didn't find it's implementation in own car production."The act includes $39 billion in subsidies for chip manufacturing on U.S. soil". I know that this "source" is not very credible, but I didn't want to search for an original.
That's just pure coincedence, that some "blue" company gobbled the absolute part of it, just to later build and upgrade own foundries, used for production of own products, all across the globe.
I just find it hilarious lol worthy that the Chinese took the best part is no part philosophy of Musk and executed it. Now they are crushing the EU legacy players. And Americans are sitting there going holy shart but they keep ignoring the great white in their yard, a walled garden for the Great White to feed on, lmao. Can't make this shit up.
India is the closest thing to neutral. No, India isn't participating with the Russian oil cap we've setup, but India is recognizing the opportunity to push their Rupee onto Russia. (IE: Russians are now forced to use Rupee for Oil, which still has huge problems to Russia). So India is just being selfish, neither collaborating with USA but also not necessarily harming us either. They're just selfish, and we can work with that. And its fair for various countries of the world to be selfish.
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In any case, Mexico, India, Vietnam are all excellent choices for where we can spend our outrageous amounts of money and technology to build cheap electronics, and all three would be better choices than China or further Chinese investments.
The problem here is the hypothetical war. If China closes their borders / trade with us, we need to be prepared (and they too need to prepare). We need factories that can make electronics outside of China. Electronics are a key driver of today's economy (automotive, power, industrial, machinery, technology... everything comes down to electronics these days).
And if companies like Apple or Tesla want to keep their Chinese factories, then we tax them and tax them hard. Yes, this raises prices, but at least we get "something" out of it and punish our companies who are too short-sighted to see the geopolitical problems of the next decade.
( I was thinking of this because in the past two weeks I've seen a lot of questionable listings from Canada at "too good to be true" pricing on AMD CPU's in particular and also extremely high pricing of the same CPU's also from Canada. I think there is something fishy going on there. )
The EV have the another level problem. Because the huge amount of the electronic components still being made solely in China. Once they decide to stop export, many electronic factories of the west, if not go bust, at least will have to halt the production, until the local alternatives would catch up.
And the battery and energy sides are another separate topics. The batteries just need to have a real serious invention, or the EV will stay the expensive toys for luxury "eco supporters".
The promised Li Fe "brake-through" that was going to become the significant;y cheaper and more reliable alternative, just ended up another "premium" technology.
And maybe the electric crisis isn't very much affects the US (outside AI surge), due to abundance of nuclear power. The EU on the other hand, still has to rely on coal and other fosile sources of enery to charge the "eco-friendly" vehicles. An irony indeed.
China has heavily invested into LiFePo4. USA and allies seem to be involved in future tech, as usual. (Specifically, Solid-state Li-ion. Which Toyota wants to invent before Toyota pushes into the EV market). With any luck, the LiFePo4 thing turns out to be a Chinese mistake. LiFePo4 is only good because of huge levels of Chinese investment (and I do admit that their chemists over there are good R&D). But if Solid State Li-ion comes in cheaper and safer, it could be key to us overtaking China's battery investments through 2030+.
If there's one thing they've done unquestionably wrong is to push manufacturing to such insane levels. We don't need throwaway phones every year or two nor laptops that last barely 5 years! Again not the only party to blame but they had a major part in driving consumer parts to unsustainably cheap levels in the last decade or so.
The **actual** problem is that if a war starts up in 5 years, China will be far more knowledgeable at mass-production of Li-ion (and already are better than us at low cost mass-production of electronics. Even highly sophisticated electronics like the iPhone).
If we suddenly came out to a war between our nations, China's manufacturing advantage would be key in the early days. It will take years for USA to ramp up and build our own factories, while the Chinese factories would immediately switch from peacetime Li-ions for phones/games into wartime Li-ions for Drones and other weaponry.
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I don't think it makes sense to use sanctions as an economic weapon. Sanctions make everything more expensive for everyone (both China and USA). But by encouraging our industry to cut ourselves off of cheap Chinese labor+electronics, we better prepare ourselves for the worst.
Accepting higher prices, but strengthening our geopolitical situation, is a good thing. I know we're all hurting from higher prices / inflation / etc. etc. already, but it would be so much worse if these higher prices hit us during wartime... rather than years ahead when we could better prepare ourselves and our budgets.
Same goes for TV's, washing machines, refrigerators etc. Can't say too much about rest of the world but that's the case here.
It doesn't matter if you're Samsung (Galaxy), highly-reputable Japanese/Panasonic Li-ion or dirt-cheap Chinese Li-ion, all Li-ion has this problem. Now different manufacturers can mitigate the problem... but **fundamentally** the issue is that we have a highly powerful spark-generator / source of electricity hooked up to extremely flammable electrolyte.
LiFePo4 (which China has heavily invested into) is harder to burn, but its still flammable. Just not "as" flammable.
That's why Toyota is waiting for Solid State batteries, because they think that the safety / overheating / fire issue is solved when you build a battery out of non-flammable ceramics rather than out of... flammable parts and flammable chemistry. We will see in 2 or 3 years. Toyota is supposed to come out with a production vehicle with Solid State Battery tech in 2025 and ramp up production into 2026.
Ford is also investing into solid state batteries, but is on a 2030-ish timescale instead.