Jonas Nahm
@jonasnahm.com
Associate Professor at Hopkins/SAIS. Former White House industrial strategy economist. Industrial policy, trade, climate, economic security. Views my own. DC | HNL. 🏳️🌈
1/ The NEIS Center has been publishing on industrial strategy for a year now. My own take on where the research has landed: some questions we've made real progress on, some assumptions that shifted, and some genuinely new questions. neiscenter.substack.com/p/green-indu...
Green Industrial Strategy: What a Year Has Taught Us
The NEIS Center's Jonas Nahm reflects on how our research has enhanced our understanding of industrial strategy, and what's to come.
neiscenter.substack.com
1/ The Economist has a piece on Chinese firms selling off US solar/battery assets after the FEOC rules kicked in. It documents the fire sale well but misses what's actually being bought and sold. www.economist.com/china/2026/0...
16. CEA alum @jonasnahm.com and @danieldrisc.com turn to the question of America's growth model - and how different clean production strategies can lean into it, or may need to tilt against it. They call for an honest reckoning with the trade-offs of either. rooseveltinstitute.org/publications...
Decarbonize America’s Growth Model
How the U.S. growth model shapes climate and industrial policy, and why balancing domestic manufacturing with consumer demand is key to decarbonization.
rooseveltinstitute.org
1/ Beijing just put out a white paper defending itself against overcapacity charges. It's worth reading — not because it settles the debate, but because it shows how much work that one phrase has been doing for the West, and how differently we should be treating its parts.
1/ Last Friday Trump replaced the expired IEEPA-based tariffs with new 10-12.5% tariffs on 60 countries — this time under Section 301, citing failure to police forced labor in supply chains.
The greedflation critique of 2020-23 is fine on its own terms, I just don't think it tells us much about what's happening now.
Benjamin Braun@benbraun.eurosky.social · 3w agoExceptionally illuminating @adamtooze.bsky.social today. The chart, from a 2025 @somoamsterdam.bsky.social report, says it all: European carmakers went on a sellers' inflation binge at the worst possible moment (i.e., the moment Chinese competitors geared up to lower prices and take market share).
1/ Trump's OSTP just dropped "A New Golden Age" — a big vision for reforming US science: less bureaucracy, more risk-taking, DARPA-style bold bets. Sounds great. Except it's landing inside an administration whose actual actions look nothing like it. www.whitehouse.gov/science/#cover
1/ Trump signed 50% tariffs on Canada today under Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930. Worth walking through the legal mechanics, the USMCA leverage play behind it, and what it costs.
1/ The USMCA — nearly $2 trillion in annual North American trade — hits its renewal deadline July 1. US-Mexico talks only started in May, with a third round scheduled for July 20. A decision by July 1 is not happening.
1/ The USMCA — nearly $2 trillion in annual North American trade — hits its renewal deadline July 1. US-Mexico talks only started in May, with a third round scheduled for July 20. A decision by July 1 is not happening.
1/ Good interview with John Minnich on the history of China's technology transfer policies and what western governments might learn from them today. A few takeaways: www.ft.com/content/6f53...
Good thread about how the #green coalition has now added people who care about #affordability, the #economy #nationalsecurity, and sticking it to petro-dictators. #climatesolutions #climate #cleantech
Jonas Nahm@jonasnahm.com · 2mo ago1/ The purpose of green industrial policy has inverted. It used to pay for a public good: clean energy that cost more, benefiting everyone. Now it captures advantages a country keeps for itself. That shift, from a shared cost to a prize seized, is the story of the transition.
Seeing the inversion at work in energy/transportation is enormously motivating for me, as someone looking at built environment, industry, ag, etc. Things like regen ag halving fertilizer cost are showing that it will happen across the board. Not as fast as I'd have liked, but it's happening.
1/ The purpose of green industrial policy has inverted. It used to pay for a public good: clean energy that cost more, benefiting everyone. Now it captures advantages a country keeps for itself. That shift, from a shared cost to a prize seized, is the story of the transition.
1/ China's May trade data just complicated the story Washington tells itself about decoupling. Exports to the US jumped 35% — the fastest pace in five years — led by the inputs feeding America's own AI build-out.
1/ Amid all the hype around China's 15th FYP, worth revisiting this CTVC piece to understand how clean tech financing actually works in China — and what it means for Western strategy. www.ctvc.co/an-insiders-...
1/ New report from Roosevelt pushing back on "manufacturing doomerism." The sector data is important and underappreciated. But I think it also inadvertently makes a case it doesn't intend to make. rooseveltinstitute.org/publications...
Against Manufacturing Doomerism: Why and How Making Stuff Matters
This report by Todd Tucker and Oskar Dye-Furstenberg examines US manufacturing’s evolving role, highlighting its continued importance for innovation, productivity, and exports despite a declining…
rooseveltinstitute.org
1/ New piece on the NEIS Center Substack by @luukschmitz.bsky.social: conditionality in industrial policy isn't just a safeguard against waste — it also has real costs. And those costs are systematically underweighted in the current debate. neiscenter.substack.com/p/industrial...
Industrial Policy Conditionality: A Guide for Users
Public debate treats conditionality as a single dial to be turned up or down to impose stricter discipline on private actors. That framing obscures the choices that actually matter.
neiscenter.substack.com
1/ The EU-Mercosur deal entered into force last week. 25 years of negotiations, 700 million people, the largest trade agreement the EU has ever signed. Brazil's president framed it as a response to Trump's tariffs and a reaffirmation of multilateralism.
Catherine Goldberg and I have a new piece on the New Energy /Industrial Strategy Center's substack on what my lab's flagship project--the Clean Industrial Capabilities Explorer--reveals about the global race for clean energy manufacturing. 🧵
China automates while America hesitates. I have a piece in the NYT today arguing that America's strategy to compete with China in manufacturing is fundamentally misconceived — and that we're heading toward a reckoning we're not prepared for. 1/ www.nytimes.com/2026/02/24/o...
Opinion | America Has an Edge Over China. Why Won’t We Use It?
American manufacturing prowess won’t be restored without bringing new technologies to the factory floor.
nytimes.com
This is an excellent article by my colleague @jonasnahm.com. American innovation has been captured by a Silicon Valley mindset, and this has important disadvantages... www.nytimes.com/2026/02/24/o...
New on SHIFT KEY: @robinsonmeyer.bsky.social hosts an emergency episode with Johns Hopkins’ @jonasnahm.com on the Supreme Court’s tariff ruling and what it all means for the energy transition. Check it out here or wherever you get your podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/s...
What the Supreme Court’s Tariff Ruling Means for the Energy Transition
Podcast Episode · Shift Key with Robinson Meyer · February 21 · 30m
podcasts.apple.com
Today on a special emergency episode of Shift Key: I’m joined by the great @jonasnahm.com to discuss the big SCOTUS tariff ruling; what it means for solar, EVs, and electricity; and why it’s time (alas) to learn about the other tariff powers the president can use — as well as their limitations.
What the Supreme Court’s Tariff Ruling Means for the Energy Transition
In this emergency episode, Rob unpacks the decision with international supply chain specialist Jonas Nahm.
heatmap.news
The Trump admin this month made its biggest move yet on critical minerals: a $12B commercial stockpile and a 50+ country trading bloc. I unpacked what these tools can and can't do in a new piece with Abby Wulf and Sarah Ladislaw. 1/
Economy added 130K jobs in January, but manufacturing gained just 5,000—after a long slide in the fall. Tariffs were supposed to bring production back, but factories still aren't hiring.
