 |
| Photo Credit: Reuters. |
The U.S. Senate on Wednesday passed a semi-conductor bill to boast chip production and offer American companies leverage to better compete with China.
The bill
will encourage semiconductor companies to build chip plants in the United
States by providing $280 billion in funding which includes federal grants and
tax breaks for companies that construct their chip facilities in the U.S., The
Associated Press reports.
The measure
which awaits a House vote later this week directs Congress to significantly
increase spending on high-tech research programs that lawmakers say will help
the country stay economically competitive in the decades ahead, according to
The Associated Press.
Semiconductor passed on 64-33 vote in Senate
The bill
passed on a 64-33 vote in the Senate which had seventeen Republicans supporting
the bill.
Semiconductors
power automobiles, computers, appliances and the nation’s most advanced
military weapons systems.
Senate
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said the bill represented one of the
country’s largest investments in science and manufacturing in decades and that
with the Senate’s approval, “we say that America’s best years are yet to come,”
according to The Associated Press.
While
proponents of the bill argue the bill would lure high tech companies to the
United States and provide badly needed chips for the nation’s advancement,
opponents say it will increase federal deficits by about $79 billion over a 10
year period.
Speaking on the
just passed bill, President Joe Biden said the bill would create jobs and lower
costs on a number of products such as cars and dishwashers.
“For
decades, some ‘experts’ said we needed to give up on manufacturing in America.
I never believed that. Manufacturing jobs are back,” Biden said, The Associated
Press reported. “Thanks to this bill, we are going to have even more of them.
The House should promptly pass it and send this bill to my desk.”