If the Chinese want to subsidize our mass transit buildout, why not let them? Are busses really critical national security concerns?
If we needed the existing NA producers to build military busses it sounds like we’d be screwed!
I only really skimmed the article, and didn't even load the underlying paper. But it seems like a big issue was custom orders. If we need wartime vehicle production, like in WWII, there would most likely be a single or small number of designs that a facility would produce. I would expect a lot more coordination between ordering, production, and supply chain as well --- if we need mass production, tradeoffs change.
> If the Chinese want to subsidize our mass transit buildout, why not let them? Are busses really critical national security concerns?
Busses are likely not really the national security concern, the concern would be having large vehicle manufacturing. It may be easier to retool a bus factory line to build large military vehicles than a compact car factory.
I'd imagine this is something like the Jones Act, where if it works, we keep the doors open for rapid changeover to military production. That's not really working for ships... the market has chosen alternate transportation rather than building large vessels for domestic transport, and so we don't really have large shipyards that could be pressed into building military vessels if needed --- the shipyards that can are the ones that build them in peace time and they don't have much excess capacity.
I encourage you to find a vehicle made in said city with zero parts sourced from China.
That is the point.
Forcing transport authorities etc to buy local seems like clearly the worst way to subsidise industry; there is little incentive for the manufacturers to make a good or cost-competitive product.
The contention is always around the debt that is created when you let them. If China never calls the debt, that's a huge win — you just got something for free! You'd be crazy not to take that deal. But others are concerned about what happens if they do call the debt. You might not like what you have to give up in return (e.g. houses, farmland, etc.). Just ask Canada.
Of course, there is always the option to stonewall their attempts to collect on the debt, but that creates all kinds of other negative effects when the USA can no longer be trusted to make good on its promises.
Tradeoffs, as always.