US Senate to Soon Introduce $59 Billion Semiconductor Industry Support Bill

[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy New York=Correspondent Baek Jong-min] The US Congress has rolled up its sleeves to support budget funding for the semiconductor industry.

On the 14th (local time), a major foreign media outlet reported that Democratic Senators Mark Kelly, Mark Warner, and Republican Senators John Cornyn, Tom Cotton will soon introduce a semiconductor support budget bill that includes $52 billion (about 59 trillion KRW) to promote semiconductor production and research in the United States.

This bill is a follow-up to the semiconductor production promotion provision (Chips for America Act) included in the 2021 fiscal year National Defense Authorization Act passed by the US Congress last year, and corresponds to the procedure of allocating a budget by specifying the exact support amount.

The semiconductor support budget bill is expected to be included in a Senate bill that aims to spend more than $110 billion on technology research to compete with China.

The draft support bill states, "There is an economic and national security urgent need to provide funding to promptly implement this important program," and "The Chinese Communist Party is aggressively investing more than $150 billion in semiconductor manufacturing to control this core technology."

Separately from Congress, President Joe Biden included a $50 billion budget for semiconductor production and research in the $2.25 trillion 'American Jobs Plan.'