Supply Chain Management

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Do Car Companies Know Where Their Critical Minerals Come From?

The initial slate of electric vehicles qualifying for a new federal tax credit was announced in April. Key to eligibility is the source of critical minerals used in their batteries. While the list of acceptable nations of origin is still being worked out, there's an important practical question the IRS should ask: Do carmakers really know where their critical minerals come from?

Tom LaTourrette, Fabian Villalobos @doktor_wolfhaus

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Violence in Sudan, Alcohol Use, North Korea: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on the violence in Sudan, preventing alcohol-related deaths, the North Korean nuclear threat, and more.

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Militaries, Metals, and Mining

Securing access to supply, increasing global and domestic capacity, and diversifying supply chains for critical minerals should be at the top of the agenda for both nations and private industry. Failure could jeopardize climate mitigation strategies and U.S. military readiness.

Fabian Villalobos @doktor_wolfhaus, Morgan Bazilian

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Can China's Green Energy Acceleration Put at Risk the West's Hydrogen Plans?

Hydrogen (H2) plays a key role in the decarbonization plans of the European Union and the United States. Both have launched aggressive hydrogen strategies to increase the generation of H2 and deployment of related technologies. But these bold ambitions may face headwinds due to the acceleration of China's energy transition.

Ismael Arciniegas Rueda, Andrew Star, et al.

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The Time to Prevent Shortfalls in Critical Materials Is Now

China's domination of the rare earth market is a matter of economic and national security concern. Existing plans to diversify the market and help the United States break its reliance on China likely don't go far enough or fast enough, and the clock is running.

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Will Logistics Be Russia's Undoing in Ukraine?

Russia's experience in Ukraine one year in is an example of what happens when a nation tries to fight a war without fully considering the logistics and sustainment that go alongside such a fight. The consequences for failing to fully consider these concepts drove Russia into a prolonged conflict for which it was already ill-prepared a year ago, with increasingly dire consequences for its future.

Bradley Martin

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The War in Ukraine, Software Supply Chain Risk, 'Hacking Equity': RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on lessons about defense strategy from the war in Ukraine, U.S.-France cooperation in the Indo-Pacific, software supply chain risk, and more.

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Software Supply Chain Risk Is Growing, but Mitigation Solutions Exist

Software supply chain security has emerged as a leading risk because of the massively fragmented and decentralized nature of modern software development. While we still have much to learn as a community about this risk, there are concrete steps we can take to better understand and mitigate it.

Sasha Romanosky

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Is Seabed Mining an Opportunity to Break China's Stranglehold on Critical Minerals Supply Chains?

China dominates global supply chains for nearly all critical mineral resources, including the rare earths that power decarbonization technologies. Seabed mining may be a way to diversify critical minerals supply chains and break China's stranglehold on supplies of some of the world's most important natural resources.

Tom LaTourrette

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Emerging Domestic Battery Supply Chain Should Be Wary of China's Information Ops

China has a huge stake in producing lithium-ion batteries, and is not above waging disinformation campaigns against U.S. firms involved in the battery supply chain. Extraction sector companies could work with cybersecurity experts and the U.S. intelligence community to educate their executives and local governments about any foreign disinformation risks.

Fabian Villalobos @doktor_wolfhaus

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Enhance U.S. Rare Earth Security Through International Cooperation

Most rare earth elements and materials are sourced from overseas but China dominates extraction and processing. With closer multinational cooperation, the United States and its allies and partners could reduce vulnerabilities due to the dependency on China.

Marta Kepe @martakepe, Fabian Villalobos @doktor_wolfhaus

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The CHIPS Act Alone Won't Secure U.S. Semiconductor Supply Chains

The implementation of the CHIPS Act shows promise for revitalizing the U.S. semiconductor manufacturing industry via investments in research and development, workforce development, and incentive programs. But executing on these ambitions could take some time and may not resolve all semiconductor supply chain risks.

Jared Mondschein @JSMondschein

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The U.S. Has a Microchip Problem. Safeguarding Taiwan Is the Solution

Taiwan manufactures about 92 percent of the world's advanced microchips, which are used in almost all electronics, from cars to coffeemakers to combine harvesters. A Chinese attack on the island would imperil the world's supply of microchips. Here's how to offset that threat.

Jason Matheny @JasonGMatheny

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The Problem of Intra-Theater Lift: Moving Things Around in the Pacific Area of Responsibility

The U.S. joint force's ability to move materiel and people across oceans and continents is unique among militaries. But there are challenges all along the supply chain, addressed by different agencies and military commands in a complicated set of processes, and a collective reluctance to assume responsibility for the mission.

Bradley Martin, Christopher G. Pernin

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Military Yet to Fully Leverage Additive Manufacturing

Additive manufacturing may very well become a critical component of the Defense Department supply chain, but challenges ranging from decentralized approaches among the various services, a lack of standards, limited awareness and know-how among military workforce and leadership, and intellectual property issues could prevent the Pentagon from realizing its potential.

Samantha McBirney, Phillip Burton

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Supply Chain Disruptions: The Risks and Consequences

With interdependence comes risk, and in the case of supply chains, these risks often are not fully appreciated. A systematic effort, cutting across agencies and public and private sectors, could be one way to ensure that vulnerabilities are understood and mitigated.

Bradley Martin

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China and Russia, Wages and Insurance, Refugees and Technology : RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on China-Russia ties, considerations when raising the minimum wage, how refugees use digital devices, and more.

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Stress Tests: The Right Tool for Strengthening Supply Chains

Isolated interruptions to individual supply chains feel like a thing of the past. Today, the risks are more likely to cut across supply chains and leave companies vulnerable to shared or cascading threats. If we want to make supply chains more resilient, it's time to apply some stress tests.

Jonathan W. Welburn @jwwelburn

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RAND Art + Data, 'Gray Market Care,' Supply Chains and Cyberattacks: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on RAND's new artist residency program, Art + Data; the prevalence of "gray market care" in the United States; supply chains' cyber problem; and more.

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Supply Chains Have a Cyber Problem

We are entering a world in which cyber disruptions easily become supply chain disruptions, and where supply chains for hardware and software create new cyber risks. Managing these will demand digital-era solutions, including updating tools, regulations, and reporting requirements.

Jonathan W. Welburn @jwwelburn

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Military and Defense-Related Supply Chains

After the Cold War, U.S. logistics planners moved away from a focus on effectiveness to a focus on efficiency in the sense that little is left idle for significant periods and that commodities are delivered at minimum cost. The ability of the system to support the joint force in the event of major conflict is at best untested and could be problematic.

Bradley Martin

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Thinking Through Rapid and Scalable Rollout of Healthcare Innovations for Public Health Challenges

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that rapid innovation in the face of public health emergencies is possible. In only 15 months, 15 vaccines have been approved or authorized for use in various parts of the world. What thinking is required to support uniform rapid rollout for future public health emergencies?

Robert J. Romanelli, Michael Whitmore, et al.

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The Pivotal Role of Remote Working in the Journey to Jab the Nation

Pulling the UK COVID-19 vaccination program together was an immense logistical and technical effort. Had it not been for the working practices mandated by the lockdown, it would have been even more difficult. What changed over the pandemic to allow this to happen?

Michael Whitmore

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Supply Chains and National Security—the Lessons of the COVID-19 Pandemic

The many pandemic-related shortages that occurred in the United States and elsewhere provide a clear warning. Serious supply-chain vulnerabilities exist. We need to learn much more about this potential threat to national security.

Bradley Martin

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Unconventional Supply Network Operations: A New Frontier in Global Competition

The technological advances of recent decades that have made supply networks drastically more efficient, valuable, and essential to every element of our daily lives have also created a highly interdependent, largely unsecured portfolio of potential attack surfaces.

Daniel Egel, Jan K. Gleiman

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COVID-19 Demographic Trends, Vaccinating 'High-Contact' People, the Iran Threat Network: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on how the pandemic is shaping demographic trends, targeting vaccines to "high-contact" people, the Iran Threat Network, and more.

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Supply Chains and National Security

Lessons from the pandemic will be sorted through for years. But one thing seems very clear: The United States is not ready in a policy or infrastructure or even physical-capacity sense to respond to major shocks to its supply chains.

Bradley Martin

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Target Vaccine to 'High-Contact' People

Actively seeking out people with lots of contacts for vaccination could bring the epidemic under control much more quickly than vaccinating people at random. Vaccinating just 15% of the population would be enough to crush the epidemic—so long as it was the right 15%.

Timothy R. Gulden

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How Game Theory Could Solve the COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout Puzzle

The health systems behind the vaccine rollout are attempting to create order from chaos, sometimes with mixed results. Rather than relying on on-the-fly decisionmaking, state authorities should consider turning to game theory as a tool that could be the key to more efficient, faster vaccine distribution.

Luke Muggy

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Keep the Vaccine Moving to Save the Most Lives

The United States is waiting to be vaccinated against COVID-19 and millions of doses wait for arms. Policymakers at the national, state, and local levels have been stockpiling the shots for many reasons. While supply ramps up, policymakers could push to deliver vaccine to people instead of freezers.

Carter C. Price @CarterCPrice, John F. Raffensperger

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Getting COVID-19 Vaccines to Pennsylvania Residents

Pennsylvania state and county health departments have a number of options that could speed the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines to make sure Pennsylvania residents at high risk for severe COVID-19 outcomes are vaccinated as soon as possible.

Adam C. Resnick

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COVID-19 Options for 2021

The disorganized public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States helped ensure that the nation led the world in infections nearly from the beginning of the pandemic. With vaccines now becoming available, are we over the problem? Not necessarily.

Rafiq Dossani

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As the Vaccines Arrive, So Do the Questions

As the first COVID-19 vaccines are being administered across the United States, countless questions have arisen about what comes next. Is one vaccine better than another? Can the United States both speed up inoculation and overcome some people's hesitance to get the shot? RAND experts offer insights into the historic vaccine rollout.

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COVID-19 Vaccination: Expect the Unexpected

With emergency use authorization for the first COVID-19 vaccine now in place, states and localities have turned their focus to the logistics of dispensing it as quickly as feasible. Still, uncertainties abound. It is essential to build a process of learning into the plan.

Paul Brenner, Shoshana R. Shelton, et al.

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The Coronavirus Puts a Spotlight on a National Security Supply Crisis

During emergencies, it can be crucial for governments to maintain an uninterrupted supply of essential goods and services. As the world faces an unprecedented demand for supplies and services to tackle the pandemic, it may be important for governments to take stock of the national security risks that could accompany their choice of vendor.

Stijn Hoorens @StijnHoorens

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Don't Waste This Crisis: How America Can Begin Building a System of Health

COVID-19 is shining a harsh spotlight on long-recognized but under-addressed gaps in the U.S. health system. There may never have been a more pressing time to think differently, broadening from health care services to a health-producing System of Health.

Tim McDonald, Christopher Nelson, et al.

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The Unintended Consequences of a Proposed Cure for COVID-19

The very discussion of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine as therapeutic options against COVID-19 has decreased their availability for proven treatments, exacerbated global shortages, fueled a rampant counterfeit drug market in Africa, and worsened trade tensions. What can be done to deal with these unintended consequences?

Samantha McBirney, Sangita M. Baxi @sangitabaxi, et al.

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Supply Chain Disruptions Due to COVID-19 and Social Distancing

There are significant epidemiological and economic risks and uncertainties with physical distancing policies put into effect in the United States to reduce the growth of COVID-19. We have estimated the economy-wide impacts of a set of these policies to provide a sense of their likely economic toll.

Aaron Strong @resourceecon, Jonathan W. Welburn @jwwelburn

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Medical Supply Shortfalls, Parenting Through the Pandemic, North Korea: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on reducing medical supply shortfalls, understanding who's in charge during a pandemic, North Korea's nuclear blackmail, and more.

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Forgotten on the Frontlines of the Food Supply Chain

The working and living conditions of farmworkers make practicing social distancing, self-isolation, or quarantine impossible. In the food supply, farmworkers are the first responders who keep the supply chains going. FEMA, the CDC, and state governments should include farmworkers and agricultural communities in their emergency response plans.

Susan L. Marquis

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Examining the Weak Spots in Tech's Supply Chain Armor

When an attack on the supply chain occurs, manufacturers and purchasers should be better positioned to respond and recover. Even the simplest devices can rely on parts from multiple suppliers, which may have their own suppliers and so on. But every supplier, no matter how small, represents a potential weak link in the chain.

Lillian Ablon

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Justice for Florida Farmworkers: Q&A with Susan Marquis

In her new book, Susan Marquis takes readers inside the fight in Florida tomato fields. She traces the history and victories of a grassroots group of farmworkers and community leaders who wrested better wages and working conditions from major tomato growers and their corporate buyers.

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Campaign for Fair Food Makes a Real Difference

The Fair Food Program protects farmworkers while providing corporations with transparency in their supply chains and tremendous brand protection. It has been widely recognized for improving agricultural working conditions and for changing the culture of America's farm fields.

Susan L. Marquis

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'Product of Mexico': Why Have Corporate/Social Responsibility Programs Failed?

The Fair Food Program has been a leader in using cooperation, visibility, and accountability to meet the needs of workers, growers, and buyers. Can it be a model for addressing these critical issues in Mexico as well?

Susan L. Marquis

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Should the U.S. Rely on Russian Rocket Engines?

One of the two launch vehicles that lift U.S. satellites into orbit depends on a rocket engine made by a company located in Russia. Russia's recent clashes with Ukraine and its claims on the Crimean peninsula have caused friction with the United States and thereby raised questions among U.S. policymakers about the potential for an interruption in the supply of the engines.

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Wal-Mart Chooses Fairness, Giving Farmworkers a Boost

The recent commitment by Wal-Mart Stores to the Fair Food Program is a transformational moment in the decades-long struggle for fair treatment of agricultural workers in America but the decision is hardly the last human-rights battle to be won on behalf of this long-oppressed work force.

Susan L. Marquis

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Drawing Right Lessons from the Olympic Security Debacle

The way forward is not for the government to say no to outsourcing of sensitive functions, but to think carefully about which efficiency savings are real and which are, instead, a result of introducing a far greater degree of risk, writes James Gilbert.

James Gilbert

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Revisiting 100% Inspection

It is good that the congressmen have asked the Obama administration to revisit supply chain security. However, precipitous changes to how the global supply chain operates do not seem warranted, may not in fact improve security, and could have costly unintended consequences, writes Henry Willis.

Henry H. Willis @HenryHWillis

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Securing U.S. Supply Chain

Published commentary by RAND staff:Securing U.S. Supply Chain appearing in United Press International.

David S. Ortiz, Henry H. Willis @HenryHWillis