🚨 THE TECHNO-INDUSTRIAL POLICY PLAYBOOK

Is the United States still the world’s leading techno-industrial power?

The answer is no longer obvious — and that should worry us.

To restore our lead, we need to act.

A new joint project from @IFP @JoinFAI @AmerCompass and @newindustrials offers 27 actionable policy proposals to rebuild American industry.

Check it out at rebuilding.tech

Our organizations don’t agree on everything (e.g., tariffs), but we do agree there are immediate steps we can take to boost industrialization & innovation.

We shouldn’t imitate Beijing’s playbook — America succeeds by leveraging our own advantages.

US innovation does not rely on top-down economic mandates, forced tech transfers, or intellectual property theft.

What we do need is the same level of seriousness that China brings to its techno-industrial agenda.

A serious country wouldn't allow red tape to delay critical investments worth hundreds of billions.

A serious country wouldn’t educate the world's brightest minds only to send them away.

A serious country wouldn't cut core investments in science — but would instead target them toward high-risk, high-reward opportunities.

We can make different choices.

We can revitalize our industrial base, scale up our scientific capabilities, and build a military to deter emerging threats.

Here are the 27 proposals to make it happen… 🧵 We have 8 proposals on frontier science & technology:

1. @calebwatney on launching x-labs for science

2. @timhwang and @JoshuaTLevine on foreign data flows for AI

3. @sophiabrownh and @r_zwetsloot on reforming federal hiring

4. @LarsESchonander on reforming the SBIR program

This is the best one-paragraph explanation for what's gone wrong with our institutions: The incentives here are so bad.

astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-…

Short thread of my favorite charts showing the efficacy of vaccines...

(1/6) Measles (2/6) Polio

Most people are still drastically underestimating the potential of solar + storage.

Here are the 6 key charts you need to know.

1/ The world is adding new solar capacity at a breakneck pace:

https://twitter.com/_brianpotter/status/1902707998637625451

2/ Solar PV costs have fallen by more than 50% in just the last 10 years:

The government asked for ideas to keep America in the lead on AI.

We pulled together our 12 best policy recommendations.

This is @IFP's AI Action Plan: 🧵 1/ Create “Special Compute Zones”

- Designate sites for 5+ GW AI clusters with federal support
- Streamline permitting using NEPA exemptions & national security rules
- Fund nuclear & geothermal power for AI hubs
- Require top-tier security for AI infrastructure

The hiring process for federal government employees is unbelievably stupid
Excerpt is from @ezraklein’s excellent interview with @pahlkadot: nytimes.com/2024/11/22/opi…

1. There have been warning signs for years that many blue state policies aren't working.

Especially because states like California make it really difficult to build anything.

Here's a thread with some data... 🧵 2. People have been voting with their feet.

This is 2022-2023 migration data from the US Census.

Top states are Florida and Texas.

Bottom state is California.

The degrowthers want to force you to wash your clothes by hand and then tell you you’re better off Refrigerators are good, actually

One of the most striking charts this year:

China’s startup ecosystem has almost completely collapsed in the last 5 years. VCs in China now spend most of their time suing the startups they invested in to get their money back.

Founders are also now required to be personally liable for their company’s loans.

Hard to imagine why anyone would start a company under these conditions.

One of the worst cases of scientific fraud ever:

>cardiologist fakes data showing better outcomes for patients who were given beta blockers before heart surgery

>Europe changes its medical guidelines based on this research

>turns out beta blockers increase risk of death by 27%

From this must-read piece by @KelseyTuoc: vox.com/future-perfect…

India is in fact sending us their best.

Here are migration rates for top scorers on their college entrance exam:

36% of top 1,000 scorers
62% of top 100 scorers
90% of top 10 scorers

Twice as many migrate to the US as every other country combined 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸



Given that the US is the R&D lab for the world, the positive innovation spillovers from this migration are likely very large.

See full paper from @prithwic @inaganguli @patrick_gaule here:

nber.org/papers/w31308

https://twitter.com/___3Gs/status/1800959354943795332

Austin

https://x.com/sam_d_1995/status/1783852668139491536

Apparently the State Department intelligence unit is extremely goated

Absolute legends

The speed & scale of American mobilization in World War II is hard to even fathom today.

The US increased annual aircraft production by a factor of 70 in just five years. Other incredible stats from the piece:

Semiconductor manufacturing requires a mind blowing level of precision.

https://twitter.com/_brianpotter/status/1786377895234941306

Like it’s crazy we can even do this

The “litigation doom loop” is a huge problem for clean energy deployment.

Solar projects that receive the strictest level of NEPA environmental review have the highest litigation rate:

64%

By contrast, fossil fuel projects only have a 32% litigation rate. .@ArnabDatta321 and @EnergyLawProf have an important piece in @mattyglesias’s Slow Boring today looking at how clean energy projects can get stuck in an indefinite cycle of environmental review, judicial injunction, and then remand for more review.

slowboring.com/p/we-must-end-…

.@NatBullard's annual presentation (200+ slides this year!) on decarbonization is always a must-read for energy nerds who love charts.

Here are my 10 favorites:

1. Solar modular prices dropped by 50% last year — and the panels keep getting more efficient, too. 2. Batteries also returned to their long-run trend of decreasing in price — falling more than 10% last year.

New report from the Center for American Progress claims that "NEPA functions as a critical climate action & environmental justice tool requiring agencies to consider the environmental & public health impacts of projects."

But NEPA is actually delaying pro-climate projects... 1/ The most stringent level of environmental review under NEPA is used way more often for clean energy projects than for fossil fuel projects.

Many fossil fuel projects are “categorically excluded” from NEPA even though similar scale clean energy projects aren't.

Hard to believe that these two countries are on the same island... "As recently as 1960, the two countries had similar standards of living. Today, the D.R., by some measures, is eight times as rich as Haiti, while Haiti’s standard of living hasn’t advanced at all since 1950." @Noahpinion

noahpinion.blog/p/haiti-vs-the…

How it started / How it’s going This is not permitting reform, not even close.

Still lots of work to be done to make a bipartisan deal happen later this year — let’s get back to it.

This is probably just a negotiating position from Republican leadership, but seems like a great way to kill a bipartisan deal.

Democrats in both the House and Senate have been consistently clear that permitting reform must include transmission. The NYT editorial board had a very good article last week explaining why transmission is critical to accelerating clean energy deployment: nytimes.com/2023/05/04/opi…