Key Vote Alert – Senate – No on CHIPS Act

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The Club for Growth opposes the CHIPS Act, and urges all Senators to vote NO. A vote is likely to occur soon. If the bill passes the Senate, the key vote will extend to the House of Representatives. The results of this vote (or votes) will be included in the Club for Growth Foundation’s 2022 congressional scorecard.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, this legislation costs $76.195 billion. This legislation includes $52 billion of corporate welfare, mostly by providing subsidies to the computer chip industry. The bill provides money to fund the domestic production of semiconductor chips, for chip manufacturing, and research subsidies in the name of boosting competitiveness against China despite most semiconductor chips being manufactured in Taiwan. Club for Growth opposes government subsidies, which distort free markets and pick winners and losers in the marketplace.

In addition to the chips money, the bill provides for a 25% investment tax credit for the manufacture of semiconductors. Club for Growth opposes this tax credit, which is spending in the tax code. Instead, Club for Growth supports simplification of the Internal Revenue Code (IRC) to provide for fair and simple tax code that does not pick winners and losers in markets.

Inflation stands at 9.1%, which is generous given the actual price increases and pain being felt by the American people as wages has been overtaken by inflation. Supporters of the legislation argue China could cut off Taiwan from the marketplace, creating havoc for the economy and jeopardizing national security. These supporters must also recognize the National Debt as a significant threat to national security, because as the National Debt has exceeded $30.4 trillion – or $30,467,824,000,000 – the net interest payments threaten to eat up more of the budget than our entire defense budget.

A better solution than corporate welfare and an inflation bomb, would be to significantly cut taxes on businesses across the board to increase domestic competitiveness and investment, while vastly reducing regulatory barriers that stifle innovation. These changes to the tax and regulatory code would not only help the chip manufacturing industry, but would help all U.S. industries become more competitive against international competition.

Club for Growth Foundation’s Congressional Scorecard for the 117th Congress provides a comprehensive rating of how well or how poorly each member of Congress supports pro-growth, free-market policies and will be distributed to the public.