[Marxism] Overproduction and Semiconductors or... Thanks for the Memory

[S. Artesian]

Those of you, us, who think overproduction-- not to be confused with 
underconsumption-- is the source of capital's current, and repeating, 
predicament will be interested in the NYT article on Micron and the 
semiconductor industry, available at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/06/technology/business-computing/06micron.html?_r=1&ref=technology



A couple of juicy bits:

"The seeds of the industry's current financial straits were sown in 2006 and 
2007, when memory makers went on a capital spending binge to expand 
capacity, said Jim Handy, a director of objective analysis, a chip industry 
research firm.  "It takes two years from spending before capacity reaches 
full volume production, so the onset of the overcapacity was in early 2008, 
two years after the 2006 spending spree commenced...

As a result of the upheaval, the industry's capacity has shrunk about 
one-third, although some of that will eventually return..."


And my personal favorite:

"This is a horrible, terrible business that no one should be in, the way 
it's organized currently.... You get some incremental profits for a little 
while, then everybody moves in and there's oversupply again."


Gee, sounds like something we could say about all of capitalism, doesn't it?