fly high
Well-known member
That is hard too do when so much of what we buy is made in China.
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[Politics] Russia invades Ukraine (24/02/2022)
- Thread starter vegster
- Start date
That is hard too do when so much of what we buy is made in China.
If we start now, we'd probably be able to in about 50 years. Tarriffs could bring up 20%+ increases on imports from China which I am sure will go down well with the overall rises in cost of living at the moment
Nobby Cybergoat
Well-known member
- Jul 19, 2021
- 8,628
There should be huge tariffs on China, war or no war. Any country who can't show they have the workers rights or environmental protection in the way they create products shouldn't be able to undercut those that do.
Most of the stuff they product is low grade tat, which wouldn't take huge skill to create in other countries
I'm afraid there is a lot wrong with this statement. We have no talent in this country (or even America would struggle) for things like component / chipset design. Let alone the scale to get close to what China has. And not sure it is 'low grad tat' when pretty much ever electronic item (including your iPhone or Samsung or whatever else mobile), cars, laptop, PC etc will contain Chinese components.
Nobby Cybergoat
Well-known member
- Jul 19, 2021
- 8,628
I refuse to believe that China is the only country in the world which could ever be capable of making components. Large tariffs on China or a complete embargo if they enter the war out would allow other countries in other parts of the world to develop their manufacturing sectors.
It's exactly the same as diverting away from Russian gas etc. It's going to be tough, there will be price rises and shortages in the short term, but the alternative is a long term dependence on a malign foe and the continual erosion of our independence and security.
I'm afraid you underestimate the talent and capacity that China has for manufacturing, it is not impossible but it'd take a life time to mirror it. Trump imposed tariffs on China already of 10%, so costs went up - but the loophole was still use Chinese components but move assembly to Korea or Taiwan which in itself is more expensive than China.
This is actually my day job - and very timely a US thinktank has been working on a paper called Bring the Chips home or something like that. Here is an excerpt from that paper
'If we lost access to chips coming from Taiwan and China we would lose 85 per cent of all leading-edge microprocessors in the world, almost two-thirds of more mature microprocessors and half of all DRAM chips.
So the economic and security implications here are serious. The US would be simultaneously facing a major foreign policy crisis, shortages in those chips and all of the technologies that require them, which include key military equipment as well as critical US infrastructure.
We'd also be facing a very likely economic crisis which would be much more severe than the turmoil resulting from the recent semiconductor shortages.'
ARM in Cambridge might have something to say about that.
ARM creates computer chip designs that others then customise to their own ends. It also develops instruction sets, which define how software controls processors.
It is based in Cambridge but also has offices across the world, including a joint venture in Shenzhen, China.
Hundreds of companies license its innovations including Apple, Samsung, Huawei and Qualcomm. To date (2020), ARM says 180 billion chips have been made based on its solutions.
It is based in Cambridge but also has offices across the world, including a joint venture in Shenzhen, China.
Hundreds of companies license its innovations including Apple, Samsung, Huawei and Qualcomm. To date (2020), ARM says 180 billion chips have been made based on its solutions.
What the same Arm owned by Japans SoftBank? The same ARM laying off 10% of their UK workforce as we speak? The same ARM that don't manufacture anything in Europe?
ARM is actually one of the great tragedies of the UK and why China is in the position it is in. It should have been protected as a UK business a long time ago, rather than being sold off overseas at the first opportunity
The same thing happened with another great UK chipset company - Imagination Technologies. Taken over by the Chinese - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-britain-imaginationtechnologies-idUSKCN21W1FW
Does that mean that all of the people in and around Cambridge who have designed the chips have been vapourised, leaving "no talent in this country for things like component / chipset design"?
beorhthelm
A. Virgo, Football Genius
- Jul 21, 2003
- 36,025
except ARM, which while being bought and sold by Softbank remains in the UK. US has Intel, Nvidia, AMD and others. what we in Europe and UK lack is production, and its very very expensive to build for state of the art chips. what we'll probably need to do is look at not state of the art (diminishing returns anyway) and move some strategic production here (cars dont need 20nm process tech. US have major plant already. its about corporate strategy shifting from shaving pennies in production to securing diversified supply chains at some additional cost.
Once again, one or two seem to have slipped into a bit of a binary ‘good vs bad’ or ‘right versus wrong’ viewpoint. Yes, there are lots of things wrong with Chinese culture, just as there is with western culture, and as a society we have become unhealthily dependent on their cheap labour.
But let’s not pretend that that word, ‘cheap’, isn’t what we find most attractive about China’s workforce. It’s a relationship which is exploitative and inequitable. And ultimately, it’s inequity that is at the heart of all of this (and that is no way a defence of what is growing on in Ukraine right now, in fact it appalls me, but rather a statement of fact).
So long as one entity exerts the lion’s share of power in the world, there will always be disenchantment, discontent and the prospect of war. And there’s no easy solution to that, because an evening up of the global landscape ultimately means the west relinquishing some of that power, which will never happen voluntarily.
This is nothing new. It’s been going on for all of human history, only the stakes become higher and higher, and the human impact all the more gruesome, as military technology advances.
We will understandably watch on in horror as the atrocities in Ukraine tragically continue. Such a direct and deliberate destruction of human lives and dreams is so utterly heartbreaking.
We just shouldn’t assume that our own vantage point is atop the moral high horse. Because it’s not.
But let’s not pretend that that word, ‘cheap’, isn’t what we find most attractive about China’s workforce. It’s a relationship which is exploitative and inequitable. And ultimately, it’s inequity that is at the heart of all of this (and that is no way a defence of what is growing on in Ukraine right now, in fact it appalls me, but rather a statement of fact).
So long as one entity exerts the lion’s share of power in the world, there will always be disenchantment, discontent and the prospect of war. And there’s no easy solution to that, because an evening up of the global landscape ultimately means the west relinquishing some of that power, which will never happen voluntarily.
This is nothing new. It’s been going on for all of human history, only the stakes become higher and higher, and the human impact all the more gruesome, as military technology advances.
We will understandably watch on in horror as the atrocities in Ukraine tragically continue. Such a direct and deliberate destruction of human lives and dreams is so utterly heartbreaking.
We just shouldn’t assume that our own vantage point is atop the moral high horse. Because it’s not.
(I totally agree with this by the way)
I know someone who works for ARM (she's subject to the consultation about redundancies currently).
I am taking issue with your statement that there is no talent for chipset design in the UK, which is false, regardless of who ultimately owns it. The manufacturing of said chips is a very different problem!
This is so very important and why we must all be lobbying businesses in the UK who continue to trade with the Russians.
It is likely that only the Russian people themselves can bring Putin's tyrannical regime to an end and they will only do so if their lives are made an absolute misery and the "comforts" they have previously enjoyed as a result of the West are taken away from them.
I'm pleased to report that Pokerstars has now blocked Russian players from accessing the site due to pressure from players from other countries. Took a while but we got there in the end.
Perhaps I over stated it a bit, but my understanding was there was a huge talent drain in to Asia any way over the years so while there is a pool of talent it is still relatively small and of course the question around new talent coming through. Net-net I bet the talent pool is considerably less than it was in the 70s or 80s
nicko31
Well-known member
Yep, I'm afraid in innovation we see it over and over again. As soon as a UK business gets successful it get sold to an overseas concern. In France, Germany and USA it happens a lot less
There are skills shortages in & around "The Silicon Fen", but that's more to do with increasing demand than brain drain. There are loads of tech businesses seeded out of ex ARM staff there and plenty more that decided to start up there just because of the skills & knowledge locally.
Apparently, there aren't many ARM staff worried about the redundancy - they will most likely walk into new jobs very easily and have been promised that their weighty bonuses will be honoured.
Yes of course, but they've currently decided that means being on Russia's side.
Blue Valkyrie
Not seen such Bravery!
It has puzzled me how the Kremlin think they can hide their brutal attack on Ukraine from their population forever. A genocide disguised as a "special military operation". Bombing russian speaking cities.
They can make a good go at suppressing news in the short term but the cat will surely be out of the bag at some point.
I don't see the issue with that. I think pretending that all countries are the same and there is no good/bad is more of a problem.
Just like this:
You're suggesting things are somehow comparable, but the way China's government treat humans is far worse than western societies.
I disagree with that. Democratic societies, with free media, don't like to wage war. Russia wouldn't have invaded Ukraine if they were a democracy. Weirdly, if China was a democracy then Taiwan may well vote to join them.
I disagree. That's not to say that any country is virtuous, but it's a mistake to just lump all countries together and pretend they're all the same.
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It must be out already, surely. There is something like 20m - 30m currently living outside Russia, who have the ability to see exactly what's going on. A great many of which are presumably living in the west, and likely to be less suspicious of western media than those subjected to a torrent of propaganda in their homeland.
It must be getting back to the everyman on the Moscow street, it has to be. What's he going to do about it though? We all saw Marina Ovsyannikova's courageous act yesterday, but the world may very well have seen the last of her. As inspirational as it was, it also serves as a reminder that there is a high price to pay for being a vocal dissident.