近日，美國總統拜登簽署《芯片和科學法案》，正式拉開美國政府親自上陣刺激本國芯片產業發展、維持芯片技術霸權的序幕。《芯片和科學法案》實際上屬於美國參議院2021年通過的《創新和競爭法案》的修訂版。《創新和競爭法案》在歷時一年的立法進程中，因為激烈的黨爭和國會試圖將更多反華內容塞入其中，最終處於僵死狀態。

隨着拜登政府近期推動包含氣候、醫保等議題的“社會基建”大政府開支立法議程遇挫，民主黨花掉寶貴的“預算協調”機會，僅在國會拿到包含減排、稅收、醫保內容的7400億美元《通脹削減法案》。在已經實現阻撓民主黨大政府開支立法議程的背景下，共和黨不再需要通過劫持芯片法案立法議程的戰術來阻擊民主黨的議程，他們轉而積極支持原來《創新和競爭法案》中對美國芯片產業進行大規模資助的內容。在此情況下，急於在中期選舉前做點什麼以拉升民意的民主黨人，則趕緊對《創新和競爭法案》中存在兩黨、兩院分歧的內容進行削砍和調整，最終確保修訂版的《創新和競爭法案》——《芯片和科學法案》趕在今年中期選舉前順利通過。

《芯片和科學法案》基本延續了2021年參議院版本《創新和競爭法案》的核心精神：以冷戰思維中的科技產業對抗思路為基礎，以推動中美芯片產業脫鉤、組建排華芯片產業鏈、打擊中國芯片產業、維持美國在芯片產業的霸權為根本目標。

為推動參議院在今夏儘快啟動《芯片和科學法案》的立法議程，拜登曾於7月13日派商務部長雷蒙多及其他負責對華情報的官員來到參議院秘密通報。據美國媒體報道，雷蒙多等人在解釋過程中強調，如果沒有《芯片和科學法案》，中國就會在芯片產業領域對美國的國家安全造成可怕的“威脅”，美國會輸掉與中國的經濟競爭乃至戰略競爭。在雷蒙多等人的遊說結束後，參議院以64票對32票通過了囊括科研資助的《芯片和科學法案》，該法案涉及的聯邦資助額度達2800億美元。民主黨對其中可能引起眾議院反對、修訂和調整的內容進行適當削砍，以消除該法案在眾議院通過的政治阻力，這使《芯片和科學法案》在眾議院也很快通過並送交拜登簽署成為正式法律。

儘管《芯片和科學法案》在立法過程中最終拋棄了原打算寫入文本的限制美國企業在華投資和打壓中國貿易政策的內容，但法案文本依然體現出美國在芯片產業領域加大對中國的打壓與脫鉤力度。例如，法案規定，美國政府對芯片產業進行撥款資助和允許其享受稅務優惠政策的條件，必須與美國對華技術打壓相關立法中的規定相符。如果在美國建廠生產芯片的半導體公司也在中國建廠，則該公司將無法獲得美國政府的補貼資金。

這意味着，與中國芯片產業或被美國商務部列入制裁名單的中國企業存在供應鏈、研發投資或技術合作的企業，將不可能得到《芯片和科學法案》的補貼資金。任何考慮在美國建廠生產芯片的企業，將不得不在美國政府的資助與中國芯片產業之間“選邊站”。

可以說，美國實際上是通過政府補貼的方式，脅迫和利誘全球芯片產業中的領頭企業與中國脫鉤、與美國結盟。這些明顯體現出冷戰與陣營對抗思維的細節表明，美國試圖通過《芯片和科學法案》，在芯片領域深化針對中國的“小院高牆”式打壓政策。然而，芯片產業的興起發展本身就體現出全球化內在規律的要求，任何違背全球化內在規律的產業政策也必然會失敗，《芯片和科學法案》及其對中國的芯片打壓政策亦然。

芯片產業的興起是全球化背景下勞動力、知識、資本、原料等優勢要素進行複雜和高效組合的結果，而不是美國等西方發達國家單獨“建立”的。例如，美國的因特爾和英偉達等企業確實在芯片設計環節有傳統的技術優勢，但中國、歐洲和其他發展中國家同樣在芯片原材料的開採、半成品處理、晶圓生產與芯片生產製造環節發揮着不可或缺的作用。美國的《芯片和科學法案》妄圖打破這種全球化背景下已有的生產要素配合狀態，試圖以一己之力建立與全球供應鏈脫鉤的芯片“小世界”，實屬對全球化必然規律的蚍蜉撼樹式挑戰。

根據美國半導體協會估計，美國若想徹底脫離全球芯片供應鏈並重構孤立的芯片供應鏈，就需要投入上萬億美元的聯邦資助，這無論從美國經濟現實還是從產業規律的角度來看，都是完全不可能實現的。違背全球化內在邏輯和芯片產業發展規律的《芯片和科學法案》，既不可能實現美國芯片供應鏈的安全，也不可能實現美國芯片製造業的重振，更不可能對已處於深度全球化狀態的中國芯片產業的發展造成實質性阻礙。

美國在《芯片和科學法案》指導下大搞反華產業“小圈子”，在芯片產品出口和芯片製造技術兩方面打壓中國芯片產業，反而會搬起石頭砸自己的腳。根據美國波士頓諮詢集團的評估，美國正在對中國進行的芯片出口限制會使美國芯片企業失去全球8%的芯片市場份額和16%的芯片銷售收入。美國正在組建的反華芯片聯盟將使美國芯片產業失去37%的全球市場收入和1.5萬-4萬個半導體產業就業崗位。市場份額的萎縮和芯片營收的下降，會使美國企業在新一代芯片研發的資本投入方面逐漸捉襟見肘，進而反噬美國芯片產業的發展機遇和競爭潛力。

同樣的，《芯片和科學法案》要求接受美國政府資助的企業必須在芯片生產和供應領域與中國企業切割，這會進一步加劇而不是緩解美國當前已經非常嚴重的芯片供應危機。儘管美國當前正拉攏台積電、三星等芯片製造企業在美國籌備投資建廠事宜，但芯片生產工廠的建造和投入運行需要數年乃至十年以上的時間，在美國本土建成可大量生產芯片的工廠之前，美國國內需用芯片的產業將在未來幾年處於“缺芯”狀態。長期“缺芯”會嚴重限制美國整體的工業產出，進而會導致讓拜登政府已經非常頭疼的通脹和供應鏈危機持續下去。

令人遺憾的是，在面臨嚴重的供應鏈和通脹危機背景下，拜登政府不僅沒有通過積極行動，在芯片生產供應鏈領域與中國芯片企業加深產業政策協調與生產市場方面的溝通，與中國深化合作共同解決當前的全球芯片供應危機，反而試圖通過《芯片和科學法案》立法，加大與中國與全球芯片產業的切割力度。這將進一步加劇對美國其他需要芯片的產業發展的負面影響，最終危及美國產業經濟發展的穩定性和拜登政府治理通脹問題的效果。這種“南轅北轍”式的芯片產業政策，最終會使美國芯片產業和美國經濟隨着拜登正在下降的總統支持率繼續沉淪下去。

U.S. President Joe Biden signed the CHIPS and Science Act into law on Tuesday with the aim of stimulating the country's semiconductor industry and maintaining its technological supremacy. The act is actually an upgraded version of the Senate's 2021 U.S. Innovation and Competition Act (USICA), which had been moribund for a year as Republicans and Democrats were constantly at odds and Congress never ceased trying to stuff in anti-China provisions.

The Biden administration encountered roadblocks in pushing through its big social spending package, which is intended to tackle climate change, health insurance and other social safety issues. Democrats ended up with a slimmed-down plan, called the Inflation Reduction Act, passed via a difficult budget reconciliation process. The $740 billion package covers policy strategies for health care, climate and taxation.Now that Republicans succeeded in scaling back the big social spending package, they no longer needed to foil the CHIPS Act. Instead, they have turned to support investment in the semiconductor industry as written in the USICA. Under these circumstances, Democrats — anxious to do something to boost voter approval with the midterms approaching— rushed to slash and otherwise adjust the USICA's content in their dispute with Republicans. They want to make sure the CHIPS act would pass before the midterms.

The act extends the core spirit of the USICA, which aims to speed up decoupling from China in the semiconductor industry, establish a semiconductor industrial chain that excludes China, crack down on China's semiconductor industry and maintain America's technological hegemony in this arena — all based on a Cold War-era technological confrontation mentality.

Back in July, in an effort to push the CHIPS and Science Act through the Senate, Biden sent Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo and other officials responsible for China intelligence to the Senate to deliver a message about stalled legislation. According to U.S. media reports, Raimondo said China would “eat our lunch” without the act. After intense lobbying, the Senate voted 64-32 to pass the long-awaited $280 billion “CHIPS-Plus” bill. In addition, the Senate chopped the clauses the House would likely oppose, revise or adjust so that the act was swiftly passed by the House and sent to Biden for his signature.

Although the act ultimately gave up the content that bans American companies from investing in China and provisions that crack down on trade, it suggests between the lines that Washington plans to handicap China's semiconductor development. For instance, under the act the U.S. government must give tax credits and grants on conditions that square with the stipulations in all legislation concerning China's technological development.If a semiconductor company that has a chip manufacturing factory in the United States builds a plant in China, then it is barred from receiving any tax breaks or grants from the U.S. government.

 This means companies cooperating with the Chinese semiconductor industry or Chinese companies that are on the U.S. Commerce Department's Entity List — in supply chains, investment in research or technological development — won't be subsidized. Any company considering building chip manufacturing facilities in the U.S. has to choose sides, either U.S. government incentives or China's semiconductor sector.

It is fair to say that Washington is coercing and luring global semiconductor leaders to decouple from China and align with the U.S. by means of the sheer bulk of government subsidies. Such details, which betray a palpable Cold War and camp confrontation mentality, have revealed the U.S. attempt to use the CHIPS and Science Act to intensify what experts call a “small yard, high fence” approach.Nonetheless, the act is bound to fail. All one need do is look at the inherent laws of high-tech industrial development in a worldwide economy. The emergence and development of the semiconductor industry shows perfectly how the inherent laws of globalization work. Hence, any industrial policy going against those laws is doomed. So it is with the CHIPS and Science Act.

The semiconductor industry has emerged as a result of sophisticated, effective combinations of labor, knowledge, capital and raw materials, not something built solely by the U.S.-led developed Western world. For instance, Intel and Nvidia have a technological edge, but China, Europe and some other developing countries play an essential role in mining raw materials, making semi-finished products and fabricating wafers, among many manufacturing links.

Now, Washington is attempting to break the coordination of production factors and build a “small chip world” that is decoupled from global supply chains, challenging the laws of globalization in a fanciful way. The CHIPS Act can neither help the U.S. achieve a secure chip supply chain nor rejuvenate the country's domestic chip manufacturing sector. Moreover, it won't pose a material barrier slowing the development of China's semiconductor industry, which has been deeply involved globally.

Instead, the United States will only hurt itself with its “CHIPS-Plus act. Boston Consulting Group once forecast that “the U.S. semiconductor companies could lose 8 percentage points of global share and 16 percent of their revenue if the U.S. maintains the restrictions that are already in force on access by Chinese companies to products containing U.S. technology that's included on the current Entity List.” On top of that, the management consultancy predicted that U.S. semiconductor companies could lose 37 percent of their revenue and up to 40,000 jobs.Shrinking market share and a slump in chip revenues will put U.S. companies in dire straits when it comes to investing in the research and development next-generation chips, which will gradually erode the country's competitiveness in the semiconductor industry. 

Likewise, the act requires recipients of U.S. government subsidies to cut off ties with Chinese companies in chip manufacturing and supply, which will worsen the already severe crises in the chip supply chain, not to mention inflation.Now Washington is roping in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and Samsung to build domestic chipmaking facilities, but it usually takes up to a decade for such a facility to begin operations. Thus, before chips are mass produced on U.S. soil, the industries that rely heavily on chips will suffer perennial shortages. Prolonged chip shortages, in turn, will restrict U.S. industrial output and aggravate the current supply chain and inflation crisis that has been plaguing the Biden administration for quite some time.

Unfortunately, Biden and his cabinet have failed to take action to address the global chip shortage, together with China. Rather they have pushed through the CHIPS-Plus act to decouple from the Chinese and global semiconductor industry. This chip policy will ultimately drown the U.S. semiconductor industry and the American economy amid Biden's sinking approval ratings.