Companies which solve big national challenges will always receive special goodies from governments. In America, Intel is having a moment from the American people: “In Arizona, a historic collaboration unfolded on Wednesday, as the Biden administration announced a monumental investment in Intel, aimed at propelling the nation’s semiconductor industry to unprecedented heights. A substantial sum of nearly $20 billion in grants and loans has been earmarked, marking the government’s most ambitious endeavor yet to bolster domestic chip production.”
Nigerians: now you understand why Dangote Refinery, etc, are not exceptions. When you accumulate and compound capabilities to solve problems in economies which governments want solved but have limited capabilities, they typically dance to you. I have called this the “conglomerate tax”. Simply, conglomerate tax is a phenomenon where nations and citizens pay taxes to conglomerates, because they help them fix transformational market frictions in their economies, which most times only those corporations can fix!
Lesson: be big with special capabilities and #Rules
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Revolutionizing American Semiconductors: U.S. Awards $20bn to Intel
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The mighty think about maximizing economic opportunities, while the weak talk about level playing field. Have you heard from the mighty talking about level playing field? It’s always left for the disadvantaged to talk about such things. But again, there is nothing like level playing field in economic landscapes, if it were to be so, communism would have been the most effective governance system, but it’s not.
When government wants answers to big problems, it does not go to the weak or average people, rather it’s the mighty and capable ones. The normal thing is for the poor to despise the rich and question the privileges they enjoy, while the rich show contempt to the poor and dismiss them as being ungrateful and disgruntled.
At the end of the day, it’s those that think about maximizing opportunities that will always take the trophies home, while the rest keep talking about level playing field. It is what it is.