Trying to write something about CHIPS, IRA, and American industrial policy. But so far the only thing that has jelled has been the history-oriented preliminary throat-clearing:

Back in the 1840s Friedrich Engels was really annoyed by the writings of the economists that crossed his desk. They wrote about land, labor, and capital. But there was something more important as well:

A factor which the economist does not think about…. What has the economist to do with inventiveness? Have not all inventions fallen into his lap without any effort on his part? Has one of them cost him anything? Why then should he bother about them in the calculation of production costs? Land, capital and labour are for him the conditions of wealth, and he requires nothing else. Science is no concern of his. What does it matter to him that he has received its gifts through Berthollet, Davy, Liebig, Watt, Cartwright, etc.–gifts which have benefited him and his production immeasurably?… A single achievement of science like James Watt’s steam-engine has brought in more for the world in the first fifty years of its existence than the world has spent on the promotion of science since the beginning of time…

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