Scaling Laws Export Controls: Janet Egan, Sam Winter-Levy, and Peter Harrell on the White House's Semiconductor Decision
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Aug 19, 2025 
Peter Harrell, former senior director for international economics at the White House, Janet Egan, senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, and Sam Winter-Levy, fellow at Carnegie, delve into the recent export controls on AI semiconductors to China. They discuss the implications of allowing companies like Nvidia to export advanced chips, the constitutional legality of export taxes, and the strategic risks to international coalitions. The conversation highlights the tension between national security and the global tech race.
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Export Controls Intended To Thread A Needle
- The U.S. export controls aimed to block China from advanced AI training chips while allowing older chips to limit Chinese indigenization incentives.
- This “thread the needle” strategy balanced hurting China’s AI progress and avoiding accelerated domestic Chinese semiconductor development.
H20 Chips Still Shift Strategic Balance
- The H20 is not the bleeding-edge H100 but still provides crucial inference and high-bandwidth capabilities China lacks domestically.
- Selling H20s risks eroding U.S. compute superiority by enabling better model deployment and experimentation in China.
Allied Cohesion Underpins Export Controls
- U.S. export controls rely heavily on allied cooperation because key bottleneck components are made outside the U.S.
- A unilateral U.S. decision to permit sales undermines the semiconductor coalition and risks weakening future allied cooperation.