alt Hacker NewsI wonder how Chinese companies can make their models so much cheaper than the US companies. I'm not sure government subsidies are the answer. Subsidizing a single company with a few billion dollars, maybe. Subsidizing at least three companies with 10s of billions of dollars annually? Do we have proof of that? I assume we can't pin it on the lower cost of engineers in China, either. The top engineers are not that cheaper, and isn't engineering cost a small fraction of the cost of the model companies? Besides, if engineering cost is the driving force, can we really say that the US companies have a technical edge?
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Why wouldn't they? They subsidized their EV industry with 230 billion dollars over the last 14 years. Solar was before that with about 17 billion.
The US puts about 0.4% of GDP towards various subsidies, China is around 4%. This isn't about cost of engineering, it's money thrown at industries directly to boost them. The us provides tax incentives. China just gives you subsidized loans to the businesses they choose to dominate.
Because that's the only way they win right now.
In the US, why make a scrappy small model when a big tech company will pay you a stupid salary for working on their big one?