How is it that Texas gets these fabs to move there. I would have assumed due to the weather (it is hot and humid in there), and hurricane other states might have been a better option! Can someone explain it?
If I had to guess, manufacturers built fabs there due to government subsidies and very low or non-existant regulations.
Also, little known fact, but high tech companies were already in Austin, Texas. It's called "Silicon Hills", and Austin area has a surprisingly well educated work force, despite the stereotypical image of Texas.
some, likely given UT, but on the whole, nope. of course, is the labor running a fab really all that high-tech? I expect no more than a drone on a Ford F-150 assembly line. and do the math: $17 Billion plus for 2,000 jobs??? talk about an out-of-control capital/labor ratio.
According to the article, "Samsung will receive hundreds of millions in incentives from the state, the county, and the city".
So, per hundred mil, that works out to $50k per direct job, or about $11k per direct + indirect job. Just multiply those figures by however many hundred mil of subsidies they got and decide if *that* is a good deal.
Economics Explained (YouTube Channel) did a good video on the economy of Texas that goes over this. On the surface it seems like a poor model, but long term it works out very well for them.
"On the surface it seems like a poor model, but long term it works out very well for them. "
I'm an econ, by training. the outcome of all those 'models' are predetermined, and based on 'fuzzy data' manipulated by 'fuzzy math'. remember, those are the same econs and models that have been used for decades to justify 'billionaire welfare' in support of all manner of vanity projects, like sports stadiums.
Texas is ginormous, the Austin area is far away from hurricanes and the worst humidity. Not far from dry west Texas but still access to water.
Also, much of the semiconductor industry originated in Texas. Texas Instruments is a transistor and IC pioneer, its engineers hold a lot of first this and thats. The name is not a coincidence.
and yes, there is a Colorado River in Austin (news to me actually). It's not the one that flows through the Grand Canyon, aka not the one under severe pressure with drying up reservoirs and which doesn't even reach the ocean. The one in Texas is subject to drought conditions from time to time but I'm not really confident you were talking about that one
I can explain it. Texas is larger than most countries. Hurricanes and humidity are only in the coastal areas. West Texas doesn't have the population or infrastructure to support a fab of this type. Central Texas on the other hand....fairly ideal, especially with the tax and workforce support. No riots, and other political things of this nature play a factor in decisions today as well.
The company is called "Texas Instruments" for goodness sake. They are not moving there. Texas is the largest state in continental US (second to Alaska which doesn't count for manufacturing for obvious reasons).
Well for one thing Texas is pretty big. Hurricanes don't get very far inland before they peter out. Also hmumidity is not a factor again becuse of the distance from the coast. No matter what happened this past winter Texas actually has a pretty good infrastructure. The reputation for hot climate is overblown it just depends on where in Texas you are. Sure it can be hot but then there are long periods of very mild springs falls and winter...nearly no snow. THere are no earth quakes or forest fires. Our road system is second only to California ( where all the quakes and forest fire are) Another factor is that space is cheap because after all...there is a lot of it in Texas. Housing is relatively inexpensive...its very easy to live in Texas for less than you need on either coast. Quality of life good. Good schools. Great Mexican food. Enegy is cheap and abundant. Great location. You are 3 hrs or less flying time to anywhere in the country. In spite of what the rest of the county thinks Texas is not full of illiterate farm hands and cowboys. There is a huge pool of relatively well eductaed folks. In fact Taylor, the site mentioned above, is in the same central Texas region as Austin . That entire central Texas reigion has become a really significant area of tech incubation. There are super important consortiums of private enterprise , state and local goverments and Higher education fostering tech development. So you see if you do an actual comparative analysis of other location Texas comes out pretty good.
Big state. These fabs are around Austin, which is further inland and not subject to the direct effects of hurricanes, though it can get a lot of rain as the diminished storms move inland.
As for the humidity, Austin isn't as bad as Houston. Plus pretty much everything in Texas has air conditioning, especially fabs. Also I'm not sure even coastal Texas is humid when compared to some other centers of semiconductor manufacturing, ie Taiwan.
TX is relatively stable, geologically, though that's not an absolute requirement. Again, see Taiwan (and Oregon, and California).
And, as others have noted, Austin has an educated workforce and a long history of semiconductor design and manufacturing.
Oh yeah, TX politicians are proud lapdogs for big business.
You are actually correct, it goes with risk assessment and incentives. Close to body of water, low environmental risks, work force, supply chain, and how much the state/country will kiss ass to them.
The article is wrong on one point though, in no way is it going to allow them to produce chips in the USA for USA customers for most part, most of the growth is overseas, it will ship them out most likely, and just use US resources.
> in no way is it going to allow them to produce chips in the USA for USA customers
I think the main goal, in this regard, is to give military equipment makers a US-based fab for getting chips made on a cutting-edge process. I think Glo Fo served that role, until they decided to cancel their 7 nm node.
This is a smart hedge against China invading Taiwan and seizing control of TSMC's fabs. Not enough, but it's something. And if that happens, the US could actually use the Defense Production Act to commandeer (some of) the Samsung fab's capacity and redirect it as needed.
Building fabs in Texas is such a bad idea. You can't rely on Texas' power infrastructure, and having power that doesn't get unexpectedly cut off is one of most important aspect of fabs.
In the past, entire batches were destroyed from unexpected power outages at DRAM fabs. I don't see how building a fab in a power network that is prone to failing, with no wider area power network it can fall back onto, is a smart business idea.
(If you don't know what I am talking about, go google "texas interconnection" and "Texas power crisis")
When someone spends 30B$, I would assume they have done studies about power network. I agree with you about Texas, though. I like the food, but I do not like to live there myself.
"Is anyone seriously talking about such a thing? Source?"
yes, just Google it. many stories/reports going back some years. they'll have to do something, a fab requires gazillion gallons of clean water. the Colorado isn't clean, and nearly dried up. there's no meteorological evidence that the Western Drought is about to end. water restrictions, esp. on the Southern Basin, have already been enforced, and next year they get worse. I guess Samsung/Abbott figure they can take it from farmers and families?
> yes, just Google it. many stories/reports going back some years.
Are we still talking about Texas, or do you mean like northern plains states?
> they'll have to do something, a fab requires gazillion gallons of clean water. the Colorado isn't clean
The Colorado River? It doesn't even go through Texas! Maybe you mean the Rio Grande? ...but that's still far west of Austin. Austin isn't even in its drainage basin.
I'm looking at a map of the Austin area, and the city seems surrounded by lakes on pretty much all sides. Unless their water levels are historically low, it seems like the fab can probably get enough water.
Issues regarding the "Colorado River" are more of a concern for fabs in the Phoenix\Chandler, Arizona area, though even there most of the fabs' water comes from underground wells and aquifers. There is another river called "Colorado River" that runs through Texas, including Austin, but I don't think its water is the primary source for Texas fabs either.
" I wonder how much ground water is remaining, and what they do with the waste water."
go one more page of comments (as I type), and I've linked to a vewy, vewy recent report on aquifer drainage. it isn't pretty. the largest mid-continent is the Ogallala, and it's in bad shape from farmers sucking it dry. the thing is: it and some/many others are ancestral water, which means from millions of years ago (geologically capped) with no possibility of re-charge from rainfall; once it's gone, it's forever.
> with no possibility of re-charge from rainfall; once it's gone, it's forever.
That's an interesting idea. Of course, you couldn't replace at the same rate that it's lost, but I wonder if there would be some ways to channel smaller tributaries into bore holes that feed down into the water table. Obviously, too much of that sort of thing would starve downstream rivers. But, at least for flooding events, downstream residents would appreciate not having rivers breech their levees.
Not speaking specifically of West Texas, but rather some places that use well water to supplement occasionally abundant rainfall, like farther north.
Let Google be your friend. Pull up "Austin, TX" and zoom in. You'll find that in Texas, there is indeed a river called the Colorado. The river has several dams along it that impound large reservoirs, which is probably where they plan to get the water.
Um... unless there's another river in Texas called the Missouri, the actual Missouri river merges with the Mississippi in St. Louis and that obviously flows down through New Orleans.
Austin used to be called Warterloo....because there are springs and artesian wells all over the place. Austin is right where an enourmous aquafer surfaces. The entire area is like that. There are several giants lakes all over the place. Texas sufferred from serious regional drought in the 1950s and resonded by having the US corp of Engineers dam up evry river they could get their hands on in Texas. Gee I know I am sounding like a fan boy for Texas but its just that everyone seems to be spouting some superficial snapshot thinking. Lets use a lttle critical thinking here. Texas is pretty big, Yes it can be hot and yes it can be dry or wet or what ever but not every where at once. Texas from northern to southern tip is further apart than New York City to Atlanta same for east west. Take your pick either direction is more than 800 miles
"Austin is right where an enourmous aquafer surfaces.
really?? "Across Texas, groundwater is being pumped out of aquifers so quickly that more wells are in danger of going dry, and more springs and surface water may begin to dry up, according to two reports released today."
in the last outage texas prioritized businesses and wealthy neighborhoods while other areas froze to death. texas is pretty much all about bending over for businesses even if their citizens die off.
You jest, but California's power problems mostly stem from their water problems. Wildfire risk had some of their grid taken offline, during high-risk periods.
But water, fire, power, taxes, and land prices are all reasons why new fabs wouldn't go near California. Texas is fast becoming what California once was. Texans can probably look to its present as a prediction of their future.
Why would you build in California? That place is worse than Texas for keeping a fab up and running. Not only does California have issues with power, they also lack fresh water resources.
You'd think any rust belt state would be ripe for the opportunity. Yet, the article made a good point about the local supplier ecosystem that already exists in the Austin area.
the Ogallala Aquifer is in trouble, yes. That's west Texas. Hundreds of miles from Austin. I don't think you grasp how big Texas is. Austin is in the humid subtropical climate zone.
Agreed. I expect this investment likely includes building their own power infrastructure. Probably lots of solar + some diesel generators as fallback/supplemental power.
One thing that sunny, southern states have in their favor is more sunshine. This gives Texas, Arizona, and Nevada an advantage over more northern states that also have cheap land and low taxes. And as you go farther west, water scarcity is going to be a major long-term concern.
Rather than direct state subsidies, it'd be nice if the state would put that money towards infrastructure that can benefit not only the new fabs, but other area residents and businesses.
you're vomiting ignorance all over this thread. Southern states get more precipitation than the states to their north. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/The-Effective-... The Pacific Northwest is something else again, but the American South has no need to bring in water from anywhere. If you are talking about the SouthWEST yeah that's dry but it was never Confederate. Texas is the only Confederate state that could be remotely considered dry, and that's only in the western half.
"Southern states get more precipitation than the states to their north. "
consider this: "The tropical storms and hurricanes provide a substantial amount of rainfall to areas across the Southeast, and in some regions, they make up close to 40-50% of the rainfall they receive each year!"
At least you finally just came out and acknowledged you have an antiquated, bigoted view of the Southern states, lol.
Texas isn't perfect, but I can totally see what given the choice someone would locate a major corporate investment there rather than in California (also the workers will enjoy a far more affordable standard of living which will be good for them as well).
Agree, our company is scrambling now because one of the fabs was so badly damaged in the power outage it wasn’t cost effective to fix it. It was a trailing edge node and they just shut down and left their customer with no parts. Now we have to simultaneously redesign a bunch of products.
Well actually "prone" would not be the correct term. Texas' outage history is kinda wierd. Once every 10 years or so there something happens that gets national attention but otherwise pretty good. I can tell you NO facilty of any signifance anywhere would be operating without back up power sources. Can you name a specific DRAM fab that suffered any significant loss due to power outages? Holy cow if I were spending 10s of Billions on a facility like this I would be factoring in back up power and more importantly Solar Power...Texas is pretty sunny and I bet the energy companny supplying that power will be working with Samsung to do just that. I know TI produces a lot of its own power already.
"But the termination of all our utilities for an indefinite length of time? That required a complete shutdown of both our facilities and an evacuation of our team (except the critical facilities team members), marking an extraordinary event without any precedent in our 30+ years of operations in the Austin area."
Micron Taiwan Dec, 2020 Samsung Hwaseong, Jan 2020 Toshiba June 15, 2019 Samsung Xi'an August 2016 This is not a complete list.
Fabricators require a lot of power, like anywhere from 40MW to 100MW depending on scale, and all of it is mission critical. And despite all these power failures causing tremendous amounts of damage, none of these fabs seem to have backup power or UPS. Curious.
As for Texas only having power outages every 10 years or so. Weren't those caused by extreme weather events? Which, mysteriously, seem to be happening more frequently.
Backup power is not cheap. You're basically talking about building a dedicated power station. Without precedent of power problems in the localities where they're situated, I can understand how that cost would be difficult for them to swallow. Probably, they'd rather the municipality just add reliability and redundancy to their grid.
"none of these fabs seem to have backup power or UPS. Curious."
not at all. that much power requires a full-scale power plant, which demands fuel. which then sits idle most of the time. the bean counters have always, so far, calculated that the in-process losses are less than the amortized cost of such power plants. "100 megawatts of solar power is thus enough, on average, to power 16,400 U.S. homes." https://law.lclark.edu/live/news/28453-100-megawat...
These kinds of comments keep popping up. Fabs use an INSANE amount of power, the Samsung fab in Austin is by far the number one consumer of power. You can't just battery backup a fab, things shut down. In February Austin Power completely cut the fab off with only hours warning, while leaving much of downtown lit. Facilities worldwide have had power issues in the news in the last 5 years.
> Texas' outage history is kinda wierd. Once every 10 years or so there something happens
The last time Texas had a major freeze, they were warned to winterize their power grid, and they didn't do it. We really can't say this will be only a once-per-decade problem. Weather is getting increasingly crazy.
You clearly don't follow the national news, on a regular basis. Just earlier this year, that grid failed catastrophically, leading to blackouts, business shutdowns, countless burst pipes, millions struggling to survive sub-freezing temperatures, and I'm sure all too many deaths and other health problems.
Not only that, but demand-pricing lead to many paying extremely exhorbitant electricity bills.
Texas' independent grid turned out to be a major liability. This wasn't the first time, and I'm sure it won't be the last.
BTW, Texas electricity prices get so high during the peak summer months that some people actually go hungry just to keep their air conditioning running. It's not a luxury, but a necessity. This happens annually, and is another "feature" of Texas' independent grid.
which raises another question. TX has the most wind power, by a factor of 3 over #2 Iowa. one might wonder whether wind (or solar or tidal or ...) actually reduces price to homes. here in New England, off-shore is finally being pursued. we'll see if it saves money.
Windmills are expensive, though. Their main benefit is they work at night, but I remember reading a well-known (Caltech?) physicist claiming the energy inputs in making windmills were comparable to their lifetime energy output. That seems somewhat dependent on where you put it, but he was a big backer of solar as "the one, true way".
Huh? How do electricity prices influence home prices? Most of the energy inputs are in fossil fuels and in the production & transportation of the building materials, most of which are probably produced far away.
I see how electricity prices could affect the cost of living, but probably not as much as Texas' land, tax, and labor situation. And while the yearly average price might be low, I hear electricity actually gets pretty expensive during Texas summers.
February was a freak incident. While our power grid had problems with apocalyptic weather(seriously, that's the worst winter weather in all of recorded history), I'd like to see a grid that DOESN'T struggle under weather deemed completely impossible.
Upgrades are underway to ensure the grid can handle weather previously considered to be bad fiction, and under any conditions other than bizarroworld the grid's pretty darn stable. It WAS built to handle full-time air conditioning for everyone, after all.
> I'd like to see a grid that DOESN'T struggle under weather deemed completely impossible.
It *wasn't* deemed completely impossible. In fact, it has actually happened before, after which Texas was advised to winterize their grid, which they didn't do.
Also, you realize that much of the country has weather like that every year, and its grid stays up?
"Also, you realize that much of the country has weather like that every year, and its grid stays up?"
being a business-friendly sort of state, and where the wealthy have plenty of Generac, etc., power available, TX gummint makes the same calculation wrt durability as the fab owners do: is the financial loss of lost power greater (amortized/discounted) greater than the cost of replacement power (ditto)? since those impacted by grid failure are largely of the poorer classes, and the wealthy classes don't care, then there's no reason to invest in grid durability. welcome to laissez faire Darwinism.
the usually cold states, north of the Mason-Dixon line, have snowy, cold winters as a matter of course. there/here such weather is a multiple times per season event. not so much in TX.
Texas and Florida are massive and everyone is trying to move there. California and New York are the states everyone is trying to move away from. When I see comments like "why Texas" I kind of laugh. Have you been there? It is perpetual boom town.
As long as they keep the cost of living down and the politicians are sane, it will keep on booming.
--- "Texas is the second most-populated state with over 29 million people, behind California. ... Texas is growing at a rate like California never did… and that is setting a standard where Texas might surpass California in 20 to 30 years rather than 50" ---
Wikipedia has an article about the educational attainment stats for the 50 states.
I have tried now two times to point out that the data that ranked Texas last (high school graduate percentage as I recall) points to the challenge in terms of the lasting effects of an undereducated population.
For unknown reason(s) the posts are being censored. Anyone can read the ranking history on Wikipedia. It’s a matter of basic factual historical record.
There is no credible justification for deleting the posts. I thought this place was supposed to be fact-based rather than propagandistic.
That this censorship began after I strongly criticized Mode for using ad hominems constantly doesn’t seem to be coincidental. It seems like retaliation.
Much of Florida will have routine flooding problems, in our lifetimes. They also have lots of hurricanes there.
I wouldn't put New York on the same level as California. Probably taxes and regulations are heavier than Texas, but it's a big state and probably doesn't have nearly the amount of issues that you'd face in California.
All posts promoting Texas need to be deleted as well, such as the one that claims people should go there for the ‘good schools’. That’s a highly subjective claim.
My pointing out of Wikipedia’s ranking of Texas as 50th in the nation in recent times in educational attainment is factual. What’s far more political is censoring that information and leaving only promotional claims.
the choice of siting had absolutely nothing to do with the taxpayer funded sweeteners provided, without voters' approval?? no politics in such siting decisions??
It is with voter approval, though. Doublethink is par for the course. Politicians are elected via the palatability of their lies, consistent (rather than selective) truth-telling being extremely unpalatable. I coined an 'Internet law' that states if you haven't been banned from a forum it's because you've not said anything new there. That's humanity in a nutshell — knee-jerk resistance to new information. I didn't get that insight all by myself. I remember a lecture from a sociology prof about what happened to the first dentist who used anesthesia in his practice. Repackage known information (hindsight bias is pleasant) and you'll do fine politically — so long as you look the part. Try something new and be prepared for pitchforks and hounds.
'We oppose government subsidies. We think big government should be eliminated, which means low taxes and low regulation.'
They get the low regulation part right but not the low taxes bit. Every cost is a tax, including environmental degradation. They certainly don't oppose government subsidies. This 'fiscal conservatism' really means a combination of pure ignorance (doublethink and distraction that politicians are masters of — plus lack of understanding of the basics of economics) plus hypocrisy (government subsidies being fine as long as they seem to be benefiting me rather than those other undeserving people over there).
For voters who don't agree, there are LRADs. So, consent is manufactured in a variety of ways.
> if you haven't been banned from a forum it's because you've not said anything new there.
A lot of people get banned from forums without contributing anything of value. Sure, institutions tend to have a bias against revolutionary ideas, but that doesn't mean every idea they oppose has merit or thinker they ostracize isn't truly a crackpot.
> 'We oppose government subsidies. ... low taxes and low regulation.'
A point seemingly lost on many is that tax breaks == subsidies. They both have the same effect on government budgets, yet somehow tax breaks are more acceptable.
ummmmmm but doesn't the high income/wealth class benefit bunches more from tax breaks than the hoi poloi??? I mean, isn't the Damn Gummint supposed to stay out of our lives?
Probably to the AT editors, somethings do exist in vaccum without any effects or basic fundamental consequences. We can remember how that great Foxconn factory was supposed to be coming to Wisconsin and poof. It's not now because ? Better not to talk I guess what else.
Tech is political. These companies use politics to establish these fabs. The article talks about the politics.
So, apparently the new rule is that only politics that seem favorable for the companies is allowed. Aka Orwellian nonsense where press releases take the place of a forum.
Too many tech websites have tried to claim that politics is something separate from their coverage. It’s not separate at all. To make that claim is incredibly illogical.
To make it when discussing a fab that is going to exist -only- because of politics is even worse than the usual cavalier illogic.
It always boils down to one thing: ‘We only want information present on this site that makes investors happy; feel free to do your thinking elsewhere.’
It’s the illusion of community, the illusion of there being a forum. The role of the forum is to give astroturfers the ability to present information from companies as if it’s the community scuttlebutt.
LOL. Given the length of time *actual* spam posts seem to hang around, there's definitely not much time or effort being spent on moderation of the news comments.
BTW, I even try to helpfully flag them (i.e. by replying), so that all a mod would have to do is simply search the page for "spam", every couple days.
case in point: let's see how much moolah Rand "we can't afford Socialism (when it's coastal states in need, of course)" Paul wants from Uncle Sugar to bail out those idiots who continue to live in his state's tornado alley.
People have already pointed out that it's a big state and rainfall levels vary quite a bit. If you'd just clicked the Texas link, you could've seen that Austin gets a little more rainfall than 31-ranked Iowa.
Many reasons - number one is the expense of doing business in California. I am not a Cali basher - it just is more desirable and more expensive... Power, and of course I am sure they are getting MANY incentives from taxes, land etc... It's a good fit, of course they need to make sure their power works consistently - curious what agreements they have made for power. It is a scary thing for politics though as Texas is pretty even politically, and more educated workers are going to lean left....
> It is a scary thing for politics though as Texas is pretty even politically, > and more educated workers are going to lean left....
That could actually be the appealing part, from the state's perspective. It's a capital-intensive project that only involves 2000 workers. It's going to be a bonanza for local construction firms, and only some of those workers will come from more liberal states.
" It's going to be a bonanza for local construction firms"
doesn't work that way. Big Bidnezz, like Samsung, have 'partnerships' with construction management firms and contractors for all trades. they may hire a few locals for low-skill trades, but the bulk will be travellers for those 'partners'. https://www.samsungengineering.com/
> Big Bidnezz, like Samsung, have 'partnerships' with construction management firms > and contractors for all trades.
There's absolutely no way they're going to bring in all the equipment and materials from like South Korea or whatever. The majority of the construction equipment, material, and labor is going to come from within and around TX. Plus, the land owners where the fabs are being built will get a big pay day.
Eh.... A lot of the time, people get politically/ideologically invested in these types of things, like they are worried about their own region's impact in what everyone understands is the most important economy of our time.
The simple fact is that high-volume production fabs don't meaningfully impact the educational or economic levels of the local or regional electorate in the ways that people might assume.
You don't need a PhD and Post Doc from a top 10 global Solid state/Materials program to work at a commercial high volume fab.
You barely need a STEM bachelors to work in one of these facilities.
If you did, then the economic trend of offshoring fabs to places like Costa Rica, Mexico, China, or even leaving them in places like Idaho (face it, the assessment is completely honest and accurate) would never have been practical in the first place.
The overwhelming majority of bunny suit wearing workers are mid-to-low skill workers making modest salaries for the manufacturing sector, but not "white collar" money.
THIS is why they build in WI, AZ, and TX. You can pay people less money.
the tiny handful of people who need to possess verifiable or provably higher skill or expertise can be paid a little extra to live where they don't want to live in order to have 99% of the workforce paid as much as 25% lower than elsewhere.
there is a 2nd side to this that goes completely ignored: Texas has one of the largest expat communities of Indians in the US, plenty of whom are "permanent" H1-B visa holders waiting 20 years for their slot in line to get a green card. or, you know, their native born citizen children.... a demographic that grows exponentially year after year.
The point I am making here is that the economic and "marketing" argument for political partisans falls flat
relatively few people will move to TX. UTA's solid state/Materials/ECE departments will see relatively little overall increases to their facilities, instrumentation, or faculty numbers ("relatively little" compared to overall increases at competing institutes in other states, following the same trends occurrent throughout the US)
The jobs that are created will look and pay like comparable jobs by nearby employers in manufacturing or resource extraction. They will demand similar educational levels and attract a similar workforce.
However, the largest existing workforce that can be hired immediately with minimal training will consist of a large if not outright majority of people who DO NOT LOOK LIKE the traditional conservative voting base of the state or the US as a whole.
> the workforce paid as much as 25% lower than elsewhere.
As FunBunny2 pointed out, the cost of labor is relatively small relative to the capital expenditures involved. That has me thinking the lower labor costs aren't their primary motivation for locating in Texas.
> The overwhelming majority of bunny suit wearing workers are mid-to-low skill > workers making modest salaries for the manufacturing sector,
Given the high cost of failure, I think they'll probably opt to pay more for a bit higher-quality employees.
Since they already have fabs in the area, I'm sure that's a known quantity and they probably have a good idea of what sorts of employees they want, for which jobs, and how much they'll probably cost.
The irony of a situation in which a state that ranked 50th in high school graduation being deemed the most suitable for a foreign high-tech firm to use — with tax handouts (and likely lax environmental policy) — is not the only point.
Hooray for your cheap labor and lax environmental policy. What are the bigger-picture implications? Should high school no longer be mandatory, for instance? If success means a population that elects people eager to subsidize corporations while claiming they oppose government subsidies — is the recipe for this success even less education? Should generalized K-12 be replaced with the corporate apprenticeship system as some would have it?
Is that a race to the bottom? Is it an unavoidable cost of ‘doing business’ due to globalization? I remember the big sales pitch used to be that Americans would become more educated, not less — in order to be more competitive — especially in tech. What is going to maintain the ‘first-world’ standard of living for not just Texans but US citizens in general?
"Hooray for your cheap labor and lax environmental policy. "
this is the slave-wage Capitalist's Dilemma. you're only hope of making money is to Export to some areas/states/countries/regions with high wages. your workers, and their neighbors can't afford your widgets. the Red states did this first, then Mexico, then Central America, then Asia in its various parts. the only winners are the dictators of the Export states and the high wage consumers in the Importing regions.
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mmrezaie - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
How is it that Texas gets these fabs to move there. I would have assumed due to the weather (it is hot and humid in there), and hurricane other states might have been a better option! Can someone explain it?meacupla - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
If I had to guess, manufacturers built fabs there due to government subsidies and very low or non-existant regulations.Also, little known fact, but high tech companies were already in Austin, Texas.
It's called "Silicon Hills", and Austin area has a surprisingly well educated work force, despite the stereotypical image of Texas.
shabby - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
Was that workforce originally from Texas? Ba-dum-tsss 😂FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"Was that workforce originally from Texas?"some, likely given UT, but on the whole, nope. of course, is the labor running a fab really all that high-tech? I expect no more than a drone on a Ford F-150 assembly line. and do the math: $17 Billion plus for 2,000 jobs??? talk about an out-of-control capital/labor ratio.
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
According to the article, "Samsung will receive hundreds of millions in incentives from the state, the county, and the city".So, per hundred mil, that works out to $50k per direct job, or about $11k per direct + indirect job. Just multiply those figures by however many hundred mil of subsidies they got and decide if *that* is a good deal.
Ranari - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Economics Explained (YouTube Channel) did a good video on the economy of Texas that goes over this. On the surface it seems like a poor model, but long term it works out very well for them.FunBunny2 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
"On the surface it seems like a poor model, but long term it works out very well for them. "I'm an econ, by training. the outcome of all those 'models' are predetermined, and based on 'fuzzy data' manipulated by 'fuzzy math'. remember, those are the same econs and models that have been used for decades to justify 'billionaire welfare' in support of all manner of vanity projects, like sports stadiums.
The Hardcard - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
Texas is ginormous, the Austin area is far away from hurricanes and the worst humidity. Not far from dry west Texas but still access to water.Also, much of the semiconductor industry originated in Texas. Texas Instruments is a transistor and IC pioneer, its engineers hold a lot of first this and thats. The name is not a coincidence.
FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
" still access to water."not for long, unless the Colorado gets monsoon rains for years. that's the source. really, really stupid move. unless, of course, Samsung exits early.
MamiyaOtaru - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
The Colorado River doesn't flow through Texas. It's on the wrong side of the continental divide.MamiyaOtaru - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
and yes, there is a Colorado River in Austin (news to me actually). It's not the one that flows through the Grand Canyon, aka not the one under severe pressure with drying up reservoirs and which doesn't even reach the ocean. The one in Texas is subject to drought conditions from time to time but I'm not really confident you were talking about that onewaltsmith049 - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
I can explain it. Texas is larger than most countries. Hurricanes and humidity are only in the coastal areas. West Texas doesn't have the population or infrastructure to support a fab of this type. Central Texas on the other hand....fairly ideal, especially with the tax and workforce support. No riots, and other political things of this nature play a factor in decisions today as well.mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
(a short reply about "riots" was deleted.)FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
(a short reply about "riots" was deleted.)all you need to know about this outfit.
Alistair - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
The company is called "Texas Instruments" for goodness sake. They are not moving there. Texas is the largest state in continental US (second to Alaska which doesn't count for manufacturing for obvious reasons).rayhapes - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Well for one thing Texas is pretty big. Hurricanes don't get very far inland before they peter out. Also hmumidity is not a factor again becuse of the distance from the coast. No matter what happened this past winter Texas actually has a pretty good infrastructure.The reputation for hot climate is overblown it just depends on where in Texas you are. Sure it can be hot but then there are long periods of very mild springs falls and winter...nearly no snow.
THere are no earth quakes or forest fires.
Our road system is second only to California ( where all the quakes and forest fire are)
Another factor is that space is cheap because after all...there is a lot of it in Texas.
Housing is relatively inexpensive...its very easy to live in Texas for less than you need on either coast.
Quality of life good.
Good schools.
Great Mexican food.
Enegy is cheap and abundant.
Great location. You are 3 hrs or less flying time to anywhere in the country.
In spite of what the rest of the county thinks Texas is not full of illiterate farm hands and cowboys. There is a huge pool of relatively well eductaed folks. In fact Taylor, the site mentioned above, is in the same central Texas region as Austin . That entire central Texas reigion has become a really significant area of tech incubation. There are super important consortiums of private enterprise , state and local goverments and Higher education fostering tech development.
So you see if you do an actual comparative analysis of other location Texas comes out pretty good.
ahtoh - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
> Great Mexican foodsounds as oxymoron
MamiyaOtaru - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
where the hell are you from to think thatmode_13h - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Somewhere without great Mexican food, obviously.AshlayW - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
@mode_13h, pretty much yupAshlayW - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Mexican food is delicious, what are you talking about?FunBunny2 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
"Mexican food is delicious, what are you talking about?"correct me if I'm wrong (the wife always gets mad...), but refried beans are
a) putrid
b) the basis of so much Mexican food
mode_13h - Sunday, November 28, 2021 - link
Why not lookup the best area Mexican restaurant in your area and see for yourself if there's anything you like?Oxford Guy - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
Why is the post about Texas being ranked 50th in education being deleted? It’s a simple fact. Are facts no longer welcome here?FunBunny2 - Thursday, December 2, 2021 - link
"Are facts no longer welcome here?"MAGA???
easp - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Big state. These fabs are around Austin, which is further inland and not subject to the direct effects of hurricanes, though it can get a lot of rain as the diminished storms move inland.As for the humidity, Austin isn't as bad as Houston. Plus pretty much everything in Texas has air conditioning, especially fabs. Also I'm not sure even coastal Texas is humid when compared to some other centers of semiconductor manufacturing, ie Taiwan.
TX is relatively stable, geologically, though that's not an absolute requirement. Again, see Taiwan (and Oregon, and California).
And, as others have noted, Austin has an educated workforce and a long history of semiconductor design and manufacturing.
Oh yeah, TX politicians are proud lapdogs for big business.
imaheadcase - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
You are actually correct, it goes with risk assessment and incentives. Close to body of water, low environmental risks, work force, supply chain, and how much the state/country will kiss ass to them.The article is wrong on one point though, in no way is it going to allow them to produce chips in the USA for USA customers for most part, most of the growth is overseas, it will ship them out most likely, and just use US resources.
mode_13h - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
> in no way is it going to allow them to produce chips in the USA for USA customersI think the main goal, in this regard, is to give military equipment makers a US-based fab for getting chips made on a cutting-edge process. I think Glo Fo served that role, until they decided to cancel their 7 nm node.
This is a smart hedge against China invading Taiwan and seizing control of TSMC's fabs. Not enough, but it's something. And if that happens, the US could actually use the Defense Production Act to commandeer (some of) the Samsung fab's capacity and redirect it as needed.
meacupla - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
Building fabs in Texas is such a bad idea.You can't rely on Texas' power infrastructure, and having power that doesn't get unexpectedly cut off is one of most important aspect of fabs.
In the past, entire batches were destroyed from unexpected power outages at DRAM fabs. I don't see how building a fab in a power network that is prone to failing, with no wider area power network it can fall back onto, is a smart business idea.
(If you don't know what I am talking about, go google "texas interconnection" and "Texas power crisis")
mmrezaie - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
When someone spends 30B$, I would assume they have done studies about power network. I agree with you about Texas, though. I like the food, but I do not like to live there myself.quorm - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
Seems like the water supply would be a concern, too.Oxford Guy - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
This was what I was going to post about.Siphoning all the water from the Great Lakes isn't going to work in the long term, especially given how many states are fighting over it.
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
> Siphoning all the water from the Great Lakes isn't going to workIs anyone seriously talking about such a thing? Source?
FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"Is anyone seriously talking about such a thing? Source?"yes, just Google it. many stories/reports going back some years. they'll have to do something, a fab requires gazillion gallons of clean water. the Colorado isn't clean, and nearly dried up. there's no meteorological evidence that the Western Drought is about to end. water restrictions, esp. on the Southern Basin, have already been enforced, and next year they get worse. I guess Samsung/Abbott figure they can take it from farmers and families?
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
> yes, just Google it. many stories/reports going back some years.Are we still talking about Texas, or do you mean like northern plains states?
> they'll have to do something, a fab requires gazillion gallons of clean water. the Colorado isn't clean
The Colorado River? It doesn't even go through Texas! Maybe you mean the Rio Grande? ...but that's still far west of Austin. Austin isn't even in its drainage basin.
I'm looking at a map of the Austin area, and the city seems surrounded by lakes on pretty much all sides. Unless their water levels are historically low, it seems like the fab can probably get enough water.
Billy Bob VanHalen - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
Issues regarding the "Colorado River" are more of a concern for fabs in the Phoenix\Chandler, Arizona area, though even there most of the fabs' water comes from underground wells and aquifers. There is another river called "Colorado River" that runs through Texas, including Austin, but I don't think its water is the primary source for Texas fabs either.mode_13h - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
> Issues regarding the "Colorado River" are more of a concern for fabs> in the Phoenix\Chandler, Arizona area
Wow. Good point. I wonder how much ground water is remaining, and what they do with the waste water.
FunBunny2 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
" I wonder how much ground water is remaining, and what they do with the waste water."go one more page of comments (as I type), and I've linked to a vewy, vewy recent report on aquifer drainage. it isn't pretty. the largest mid-continent is the Ogallala, and it's in bad shape from farmers sucking it dry. the thing is: it and some/many others are ancestral water, which means from millions of years ago (geologically capped) with no possibility of re-charge from rainfall; once it's gone, it's forever.
mode_13h - Sunday, November 28, 2021 - link
> with no possibility of re-charge from rainfall; once it's gone, it's forever.That's an interesting idea. Of course, you couldn't replace at the same rate that it's lost, but I wonder if there would be some ways to channel smaller tributaries into bore holes that feed down into the water table. Obviously, too much of that sort of thing would starve downstream rivers. But, at least for flooding events, downstream residents would appreciate not having rivers breech their levees.
Not speaking specifically of West Texas, but rather some places that use well water to supplement occasionally abundant rainfall, like farther north.
[email protected] - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Let Google be your friend. Pull up "Austin, TX" and zoom in. You'll find that in Texas, there is indeed a river called the Colorado. The river has several dams along it that impound large reservoirs, which is probably where they plan to get the water.3dgaming - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
Are they actually talking of getting water from the missouri?mode_13h - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Um... unless there's another river in Texas called the Missouri, the actual Missouri river merges with the Mississippi in St. Louis and that obviously flows down through New Orleans.rayhapes - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Austin used to be called Warterloo....because there are springs and artesian wells all over the place. Austin is right where an enourmous aquafer surfaces. The entire area is like that. There are several giants lakes all over the place. Texas sufferred from serious regional drought in the 1950s and resonded by having the US corp of Engineers dam up evry river they could get their hands on in Texas.Gee I know I am sounding like a fan boy for Texas but its just that everyone seems to be spouting some superficial snapshot thinking.
Lets use a lttle critical thinking here.
Texas is pretty big, Yes it can be hot and yes it can be dry or wet or what ever but not every where at once.
Texas from northern to southern tip is further apart than New York City to Atlanta same for east west. Take your pick either direction is more than 800 miles
Oxford Guy - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
There is a difference between superficial thought and being an expert in one particular location.Draining the great lakes to try to compensate for the thirst of dry states is not a new thing in politics.
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
> Draining the great lakes to try to compensateExcept @rayhapes said they *created* lakes by building dams on a bunch of rivers.
FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"Austin is right where an enourmous aquafer surfaces.really??
"Across Texas, groundwater is being pumped out of aquifers so quickly that more wells are in danger of going dry, and more springs and surface water may begin to dry up, according to two reports released today."
16 November 2021 (hot off the presses)
https://www.edf.org/media/texas-groundwater-suppli...
whatthe123 - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
in the last outage texas prioritized businesses and wealthy neighborhoods while other areas froze to death. texas is pretty much all about bending over for businesses even if their citizens die off.Zeratul56 - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
They should build in state with a stable power grid, like Californiamode_13h - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
You jest, but California's power problems mostly stem from their water problems. Wildfire risk had some of their grid taken offline, during high-risk periods.But water, fire, power, taxes, and land prices are all reasons why new fabs wouldn't go near California. Texas is fast becoming what California once was. Texans can probably look to its present as a prediction of their future.
meacupla - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
Why would you build in California? That place is worse than Texas for keeping a fab up and running.Not only does California have issues with power, they also lack fresh water resources.
I'd build in Illinois, Ohio or Indiana.
coburn_c - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Ports and chemical refineriesmode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
You'd think any rust belt state would be ripe for the opportunity. Yet, the article made a good point about the local supplier ecosystem that already exists in the Austin area.FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"they also lack fresh water resources"you think Texas is different?? have you read up the plight of dry-land farming??
MamiyaOtaru - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
the Ogallala Aquifer is in trouble, yes. That's west Texas. Hundreds of miles from Austin. I don't think you grasp how big Texas is. Austin is in the humid subtropical climate zone.sweetca - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
"They should build in state with a stable power grid, like California"Hah, good one! Rolling blackouts are super stable!
mode_13h - Wednesday, November 24, 2021 - link
Agreed. I expect this investment likely includes building their own power infrastructure. Probably lots of solar + some diesel generators as fallback/supplemental power.One thing that sunny, southern states have in their favor is more sunshine. This gives Texas, Arizona, and Nevada an advantage over more northern states that also have cheap land and low taxes. And as you go farther west, water scarcity is going to be a major long-term concern.
Rather than direct state subsidies, it'd be nice if the state would put that money towards infrastructure that can benefit not only the new fabs, but other area residents and businesses.
FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"southern states have in their favor is more sunshine"which means, of course, little local water, which they steal from the Green States. how very Confederate of them!
MamiyaOtaru - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
you're vomiting ignorance all over this thread. Southern states get more precipitation than the states to their north. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/The-Effective-... The Pacific Northwest is something else again, but the American South has no need to bring in water from anywhere. If you are talking about the SouthWEST yeah that's dry but it was never Confederate. Texas is the only Confederate state that could be remotely considered dry, and that's only in the western half.FunBunny2 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
"Southern states get more precipitation than the states to their north. "consider this:
"The tropical storms and hurricanes provide a substantial amount of rainfall to areas across the Southeast, and in some regions, they make up close to 40-50% of the rainfall they receive each year!"
so, you get a soupcon of destruction to boot.
https://legacy.climate.ncsu.edu/edu/SEPrecip
gijames1225 - Wednesday, December 8, 2021 - link
At least you finally just came out and acknowledged you have an antiquated, bigoted view of the Southern states, lol.Texas isn't perfect, but I can totally see what given the choice someone would locate a major corporate investment there rather than in California (also the workers will enjoy a far more affordable standard of living which will be good for them as well).
flgt - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Agree, our company is scrambling now because one of the fabs was so badly damaged in the power outage it wasn’t cost effective to fix it. It was a trailing edge node and they just shut down and left their customer with no parts. Now we have to simultaneously redesign a bunch of products.rayhapes - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Well actually "prone" would not be the correct term. Texas' outage history is kinda wierd. Once every 10 years or so there something happens that gets national attention but otherwise pretty good.I can tell you NO facilty of any signifance anywhere would be operating without back up power sources.
Can you name a specific DRAM fab that suffered any significant loss due to power outages?
Holy cow if I were spending 10s of Billions on a facility like this I would be factoring in back up power and more importantly Solar Power...Texas is pretty sunny and I bet the energy companny supplying that power will be working with Samsung to do just that. I know TI produces a lot of its own power already.
flgt - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
"But the termination of all our utilities for an indefinite length of time? That required a complete shutdown of both our facilities and an evacuation of our team (except the critical facilities team members), marking an extraordinary event without any precedent in our 30+ years of operations in the Austin area."https://www.nxp.com/company/blog/through-the-storm...
https://www.statesman.com/story/business/2021/04/3...
https://www.eetimes.com/infineon-and-nxp-resume-au...
meacupla - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Micron Taiwan Dec, 2020Samsung Hwaseong, Jan 2020
Toshiba June 15, 2019
Samsung Xi'an August 2016
This is not a complete list.
Fabricators require a lot of power, like anywhere from 40MW to 100MW depending on scale, and all of it is mission critical.
And despite all these power failures causing tremendous amounts of damage, none of these fabs seem to have backup power or UPS. Curious.
As for Texas only having power outages every 10 years or so. Weren't those caused by extreme weather events? Which, mysteriously, seem to be happening more frequently.
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
Backup power is not cheap. You're basically talking about building a dedicated power station. Without precedent of power problems in the localities where they're situated, I can understand how that cost would be difficult for them to swallow. Probably, they'd rather the municipality just add reliability and redundancy to their grid.FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"none of these fabs seem to have backup power or UPS. Curious."not at all. that much power requires a full-scale power plant, which demands fuel. which then sits idle most of the time. the bean counters have always, so far, calculated that the in-process losses are less than the amortized cost of such power plants.
"100 megawatts of solar power is thus enough, on average, to power 16,400 U.S. homes."
https://law.lclark.edu/live/news/28453-100-megawat...
that's not trivial
FullmetalTitan - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
These kinds of comments keep popping up. Fabs use an INSANE amount of power, the Samsung fab in Austin is by far the number one consumer of power. You can't just battery backup a fab, things shut down. In February Austin Power completely cut the fab off with only hours warning, while leaving much of downtown lit. Facilities worldwide have had power issues in the news in the last 5 years.mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
> Texas' outage history is kinda wierd. Once every 10 years or so there something happensThe last time Texas had a major freeze, they were warned to winterize their power grid, and they didn't do it. We really can't say this will be only a once-per-decade problem. Weather is getting increasingly crazy.
easp - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Nothing diesel generators and huge backup batteries can't fix (until you can't refuel the generators).FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
"Nothing diesel generators and huge backup batteries can't fix (until you can't refuel the generators)."100 MW of diesel power??? to channel John McEnroe: "YOU CAN'T BE SERIOUS!!!"
TheJian - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Texas has their own grid...LOL at fools. I'm sure if there is ANY issues, tesla has brown out devices to fix that. ;) Just a block away :)FunBunny2 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
"Texas has their own grid"run by just the sort of folks who're objective: https://www.texastribune.org/2021/10/21/texas-rail...
mode_13h - Sunday, November 28, 2021 - link
You clearly don't follow the national news, on a regular basis. Just earlier this year, that grid failed catastrophically, leading to blackouts, business shutdowns, countless burst pipes, millions struggling to survive sub-freezing temperatures, and I'm sure all too many deaths and other health problems.Not only that, but demand-pricing lead to many paying extremely exhorbitant electricity bills.
Texas' independent grid turned out to be a major liability. This wasn't the first time, and I'm sure it won't be the last.
BTW, Texas electricity prices get so high during the peak summer months that some people actually go hungry just to keep their air conditioning running. It's not a luxury, but a necessity. This happens annually, and is another "feature" of Texas' independent grid.
FunBunny2 - Thursday, December 2, 2021 - link
"another "feature" of Texas' independent grid"which raises another question. TX has the most wind power, by a factor of 3 over #2 Iowa. one might wonder whether wind (or solar or tidal or ...) actually reduces price to homes. here in New England, off-shore is finally being pursued. we'll see if it saves money.
mode_13h - Friday, December 3, 2021 - link
> TX has the most wind powerWindmills are expensive, though. Their main benefit is they work at night, but I remember reading a well-known (Caltech?) physicist claiming the energy inputs in making windmills were comparable to their lifetime energy output. That seems somewhat dependent on where you put it, but he was a big backer of solar as "the one, true way".
mode_13h - Friday, December 3, 2021 - link
> actually reduces price to homes.Huh? How do electricity prices influence home prices? Most of the energy inputs are in fossil fuels and in the production & transportation of the building materials, most of which are probably produced far away.
I see how electricity prices could affect the cost of living, but probably not as much as Texas' land, tax, and labor situation. And while the yearly average price might be low, I hear electricity actually gets pretty expensive during Texas summers.
FunBunny2 - Friday, December 3, 2021 - link
"Huh?"I thought the English was clear, but just in case: "actually reduces <b>energy</b> price <b>to</b> homes."
gijames1225 - Wednesday, December 8, 2021 - link
If only the Federal Government would let Texas hook their grid up to others in case of emergencies...FunBunny2 - Wednesday, December 8, 2021 - link
"If only the Federal Government"it's the idiots in TX who refuse.
Lord of the Bored - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
February was a freak incident. While our power grid had problems with apocalyptic weather(seriously, that's the worst winter weather in all of recorded history), I'd like to see a grid that DOESN'T struggle under weather deemed completely impossible.Upgrades are underway to ensure the grid can handle weather previously considered to be bad fiction, and under any conditions other than bizarroworld the grid's pretty darn stable. It WAS built to handle full-time air conditioning for everyone, after all.
mode_13h - Tuesday, November 30, 2021 - link
> I'd like to see a grid that DOESN'T struggle under weather deemed completely impossible.It *wasn't* deemed completely impossible. In fact, it has actually happened before, after which Texas was advised to winterize their grid, which they didn't do.
Also, you realize that much of the country has weather like that every year, and its grid stays up?
Let's hope lessons have been learned.
FunBunny2 - Monday, December 6, 2021 - link
"Also, you realize that much of the country has weather like that every year, and its grid stays up?"being a business-friendly sort of state, and where the wealthy have plenty of Generac, etc., power available, TX gummint makes the same calculation wrt durability as the fab owners do: is the financial loss of lost power greater (amortized/discounted) greater than the cost of replacement power (ditto)? since those impacted by grid failure are largely of the poorer classes, and the wealthy classes don't care, then there's no reason to invest in grid durability. welcome to laissez faire Darwinism.
the usually cold states, north of the Mason-Dixon line, have snowy, cold winters as a matter of course. there/here such weather is a multiple times per season event. not so much in TX.
Alistair - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Texas and Florida are massive and everyone is trying to move there. California and New York are the states everyone is trying to move away from. When I see comments like "why Texas" I kind of laugh. Have you been there? It is perpetual boom town.Alistair - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
As long as they keep the cost of living down and the politicians are sane, it will keep on booming.--- "Texas is the second most-populated state with over 29 million people, behind California. ... Texas is growing at a rate like California never did… and that is setting a standard where Texas might surpass California in 20 to 30 years rather than 50" ---
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
(a couple replies about Texas politics were deleted.)Oxford Guy - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
Wikipedia has an article about the educational attainment stats for the 50 states.I have tried now two times to point out that the data that ranked Texas last (high school graduate percentage as I recall) points to the challenge in terms of the lasting effects of an undereducated population.
For unknown reason(s) the posts are being censored. Anyone can read the ranking history on Wikipedia. It’s a matter of basic factual historical record.
There is no credible justification for deleting the posts. I thought this place was supposed to be fact-based rather than propagandistic.
That this censorship began after I strongly criticized Mode for using ad hominems constantly doesn’t seem to be coincidental. It seems like retaliation.
mode_13h - Tuesday, November 30, 2021 - link
> That this censorship began after I strongly criticized ModeLOL. It has nothing to do with you & me, and probably everything to do with the subject matter of the article.
mode_13h - Thursday, November 25, 2021 - link
Much of Florida will have routine flooding problems, in our lifetimes. They also have lots of hurricanes there.I wouldn't put New York on the same level as California. Probably taxes and regulations are heavier than Texas, but it's a big state and probably doesn't have nearly the amount of issues that you'd face in California.
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
Wow, there's some major censorship in this thread. Several posts I thought weren't particularly off-topic have been deleted.I don't think any ToS or forum policies were violated, at least in the ones I recall. Not a good precedent, Anandtech.
Ryan Smith - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
We're a computer technology site, not a politics blog. If you want to argue politics, I encourage you to go somewhere else.Oxford Guy - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
All posts promoting Texas need to be deleted as well, such as the one that claims people should go there for the ‘good schools’. That’s a highly subjective claim.My pointing out of Wikipedia’s ranking of Texas as 50th in the nation in recent times in educational attainment is factual. What’s far more political is censoring that information and leaving only promotional claims.
Oxford Guy - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
It’s also impossible to put political facts into your article about how this fab’s site was chosen (‘incentives’) without talking about politics.Are fabs now going to be delivered by stork in a bundle — because no one is allowed to talk about the facts of tech life?
FunBunny2 - Thursday, December 2, 2021 - link
"not a politics blog"the choice of siting had absolutely nothing to do with the taxpayer funded sweeteners provided, without voters' approval?? no politics in such siting decisions??
Oxford Guy - Saturday, December 4, 2021 - link
It is with voter approval, though. Doublethink is par for the course. Politicians are elected via the palatability of their lies, consistent (rather than selective) truth-telling being extremely unpalatable. I coined an 'Internet law' that states if you haven't been banned from a forum it's because you've not said anything new there. That's humanity in a nutshell — knee-jerk resistance to new information. I didn't get that insight all by myself. I remember a lecture from a sociology prof about what happened to the first dentist who used anesthesia in his practice. Repackage known information (hindsight bias is pleasant) and you'll do fine politically — so long as you look the part. Try something new and be prepared for pitchforks and hounds.'We oppose government subsidies. We think big government should be eliminated, which means low taxes and low regulation.'
They get the low regulation part right but not the low taxes bit. Every cost is a tax, including environmental degradation. They certainly don't oppose government subsidies. This 'fiscal conservatism' really means a combination of pure ignorance (doublethink and distraction that politicians are masters of — plus lack of understanding of the basics of economics) plus hypocrisy (government subsidies being fine as long as they seem to be benefiting me rather than those other undeserving people over there).
For voters who don't agree, there are LRADs. So, consent is manufactured in a variety of ways.
mode_13h - Saturday, December 4, 2021 - link
> if you haven't been banned from a forum it's because you've not said anything new there.A lot of people get banned from forums without contributing anything of value. Sure, institutions tend to have a bias against revolutionary ideas, but that doesn't mean every idea they oppose has merit or thinker they ostracize isn't truly a crackpot.
Oxford Guy - Friday, December 17, 2021 - link
Occam's Razor isn't always correct either. Nonetheless, heuristic statements can be useful.mode_13h - Friday, December 17, 2021 - link
Occam's razor is useful only as an investigative tool. It has no explanatory power.That analogy is not informative, nor was it necessary.
Oxford Guy - Monday, December 27, 2021 - link
Translation: You didn't understand it.mode_13h - Saturday, December 4, 2021 - link
> 'We oppose government subsidies. ... low taxes and low regulation.'A point seemingly lost on many is that tax breaks == subsidies. They both have the same effect on government budgets, yet somehow tax breaks are more acceptable.
FunBunny2 - Monday, December 6, 2021 - link
"yet somehow tax breaks are more acceptable."ummmmmm but doesn't the high income/wealth class benefit bunches more from tax breaks than the hoi poloi??? I mean, isn't the Damn Gummint supposed to stay out of our lives?
Silver5urfer - Sunday, November 28, 2021 - link
Even my basic one which just mentions how housing cost is going to become worse is also removed.Silver5urfer - Sunday, November 28, 2021 - link
Probably to the AT editors, somethings do exist in vaccum without any effects or basic fundamental consequences. We can remember how that great Foxconn factory was supposed to be coming to Wisconsin and poof. It's not now because ? Better not to talk I guess what else.Oxford Guy - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
Tech is political. These companies use politics to establish these fabs. The article talks about the politics.So, apparently the new rule is that only politics that seem favorable for the companies is allowed. Aka Orwellian nonsense where press releases take the place of a forum.
mode_13h - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
I understand the need to keep off-topic flame wars from erupting.That's why I tried to focus on suggestions for how the policy is enforced.
Hopefully, my posts about that were at least read by the mod who removed them.
Oxford Guy - Monday, November 29, 2021 - link
Too many tech websites have tried to claim that politics is something separate from their coverage. It’s not separate at all. To make that claim is incredibly illogical.To make it when discussing a fab that is going to exist -only- because of politics is even worse than the usual cavalier illogic.
It always boils down to one thing: ‘We only want information present on this site that makes investors happy; feel free to do your thinking elsewhere.’
It’s the illusion of community, the illusion of there being a forum. The role of the forum is to give astroturfers the ability to present information from companies as if it’s the community scuttlebutt.
erotomania - Friday, December 10, 2021 - link
See guys, this is why Ryan can't review GPUs anymore. He's gotta babysit this group full time now.mode_13h - Saturday, December 11, 2021 - link
> He's gotta babysit this group full time now.LOL. Given the length of time *actual* spam posts seem to hang around, there's definitely not much time or effort being spent on moderation of the news comments.
BTW, I even try to helpfully flag them (i.e. by replying), so that all a mod would have to do is simply search the page for "spam", every couple days.
Oxford Guy - Friday, December 17, 2021 - link
'He's gotta babysit this group full time now.'Indeed. Critical thinking is for babies. Adults are happy to be on the dole, regardless of how irrational the politics are.
FunBunny2 - Monday, December 20, 2021 - link
" Adults are happy to be on the dole"case in point: let's see how much moolah Rand "we can't afford Socialism (when it's coastal states in need, of course)" Paul wants from Uncle Sugar to bail out those idiots who continue to live in his state's tornado alley.
FunBunny2 - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
So, here's the state list of rainfall: https://www.currentresults.com/Weather/US/average-...TX is 34th. not the brightest place to put a water gulper.
mode_13h - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
People have already pointed out that it's a big state and rainfall levels vary quite a bit. If you'd just clicked the Texas link, you could've seen that Austin gets a little more rainfall than 31-ranked Iowa.https://www.currentresults.com/Weather/Texas/avera...
3dgaming - Friday, November 26, 2021 - link
Many reasons - number one is the expense of doing business in California. I am not a Cali basher - it just is more desirable and more expensive... Power, and of course I am sure they are getting MANY incentives from taxes, land etc... It's a good fit, of course they need to make sure their power works consistently - curious what agreements they have made for power. It is a scary thing for politics though as Texas is pretty even politically, and more educated workers are going to lean left....mode_13h - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
> It is a scary thing for politics though as Texas is pretty even politically,> and more educated workers are going to lean left....
That could actually be the appealing part, from the state's perspective. It's a capital-intensive project that only involves 2000 workers. It's going to be a bonanza for local construction firms, and only some of those workers will come from more liberal states.
FunBunny2 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
" It's going to be a bonanza for local construction firms"doesn't work that way. Big Bidnezz, like Samsung, have 'partnerships' with construction management firms and contractors for all trades. they may hire a few locals for low-skill trades, but the bulk will be travellers for those 'partners'.
https://www.samsungengineering.com/
guess I was right.
mode_13h - Sunday, November 28, 2021 - link
> Big Bidnezz, like Samsung, have 'partnerships' with construction management firms> and contractors for all trades.
There's absolutely no way they're going to bring in all the equipment and materials from like South Korea or whatever. The majority of the construction equipment, material, and labor is going to come from within and around TX. Plus, the land owners where the fabs are being built will get a big pay day.
JCB994 - Saturday, November 27, 2021 - link
Samsung has two fabs in Austin...the first started up in 1997 and is 8". The second started about 10 years later is 12".BonglerMongler - Wednesday, December 1, 2021 - link
Eh.... A lot of the time, people get politically/ideologically invested in these types of things, like they are worried about their own region's impact in what everyone understands is the most important economy of our time.The simple fact is that high-volume production fabs don't meaningfully impact the educational or economic levels of the local or regional electorate in the ways that people might assume.
You don't need a PhD and Post Doc from a top 10 global Solid state/Materials program to work at a commercial high volume fab.
You barely need a STEM bachelors to work in one of these facilities.
If you did, then the economic trend of offshoring fabs to places like Costa Rica, Mexico, China, or even leaving them in places like Idaho (face it, the assessment is completely honest and accurate) would never have been practical in the first place.
The overwhelming majority of bunny suit wearing workers are mid-to-low skill workers making modest salaries for the manufacturing sector, but not "white collar" money.
THIS is why they build in WI, AZ, and TX. You can pay people less money.
the tiny handful of people who need to possess verifiable or provably higher skill or expertise can be paid a little extra to live where they don't want to live in order to have 99% of the workforce paid as much as 25% lower than elsewhere.
there is a 2nd side to this that goes completely ignored: Texas has one of the largest expat communities of Indians in the US, plenty of whom are "permanent" H1-B visa holders waiting 20 years for their slot in line to get a green card. or, you know, their native born citizen children.... a demographic that grows exponentially year after year.
The point I am making here is that the economic and "marketing" argument for political partisans falls flat
relatively few people will move to TX. UTA's solid state/Materials/ECE departments will see relatively little overall increases to their facilities, instrumentation, or faculty numbers ("relatively little" compared to overall increases at competing institutes in other states, following the same trends occurrent throughout the US)
The jobs that are created will look and pay like comparable jobs by nearby employers in manufacturing or resource extraction. They will demand similar educational levels and attract a similar workforce.
However, the largest existing workforce that can be hired immediately with minimal training will consist of a large if not outright majority of people who DO NOT LOOK LIKE the traditional conservative voting base of the state or the US as a whole.
mode_13h - Wednesday, December 1, 2021 - link
> the workforce paid as much as 25% lower than elsewhere.As FunBunny2 pointed out, the cost of labor is relatively small relative to the capital expenditures involved. That has me thinking the lower labor costs aren't their primary motivation for locating in Texas.
> The overwhelming majority of bunny suit wearing workers are mid-to-low skill
> workers making modest salaries for the manufacturing sector,
Given the high cost of failure, I think they'll probably opt to pay more for a bit higher-quality employees.
Since they already have fabs in the area, I'm sure that's a known quantity and they probably have a good idea of what sorts of employees they want, for which jobs, and how much they'll probably cost.
Oxford Guy - Thursday, December 2, 2021 - link
The irony of a situation in which a state that ranked 50th in high school graduation being deemed the most suitable for a foreign high-tech firm to use — with tax handouts (and likely lax environmental policy) — is not the only point.Hooray for your cheap labor and lax environmental policy. What are the bigger-picture implications? Should high school no longer be mandatory, for instance? If success means a population that elects people eager to subsidize corporations while claiming they oppose government subsidies — is the recipe for this success even less education? Should generalized K-12 be replaced with the corporate apprenticeship system as some would have it?
Is that a race to the bottom? Is it an unavoidable cost of ‘doing business’ due to globalization? I remember the big sales pitch used to be that Americans would become more educated, not less — in order to be more competitive — especially in tech. What is going to maintain the ‘first-world’ standard of living for not just Texans but US citizens in general?
FunBunny2 - Thursday, December 2, 2021 - link
"Hooray for your cheap labor and lax environmental policy. "this is the slave-wage Capitalist's Dilemma. you're only hope of making money is to Export to some areas/states/countries/regions with high wages. your workers, and their neighbors can't afford your widgets. the Red states did this first, then Mexico, then Central America, then Asia in its various parts. the only winners are the dictators of the Export states and the high wage consumers in the Importing regions.