What about all the U.S. debt China owns ($1.1T)? Might China start calling on their loans to us if we start moving too much out of their sphere of influence?
Yeah, that’s been the game of chicken for a while now. The U.S. can tell them to pound sand. That would certainly have an impact on the USD. On the other hand, the U.S. is the biggest single economy in the world and China doesn’t have very many allies around the world who can influence the U.S. So both would take an economic hit but I suspect China would bear the brunt of it.
I’m not sure I understand where you are coming from. They could sell their US treasury notes, to be sure…why would that hurt the US? And how do you expect that to help China? There is a reason why they own the things, and in face, after they drew down on them a few years ago by selling off quite a bit, they have slowly been buying them back again.
It’s not like they are the bank and those are loans and they can foreclose on the country, or even send over their buddy to break our knee caps. It would hurt China a lot more than the US if China decided to sell those off, as it’s probably the only stable thing they have right now, considering their own ocean of troubles lately.
This is a large factor. The work culture in China is simply day and night different than in America. You can get many things done there that you can’t here, in much less time. Of course, being able to trample on human dignity speeds things up too.
I don’t see why America can’t work with it’s allies to maintain control over the global economy, ie. Use China to benefit western countries like they’ve always historically done. Instead the Trumpets are working to isolate America and give China all the economic power. Pulling out of the TPP was just giving a win to China. Trump’s damage will only be obvious in 10 years, but Of course, by then all the idiots will think he was a noble warrior 
. Strategic thinking in American policy is dead due to anti-intellectualism/Facebook memes and Russia and China can’t hide their huge grins.
You know, this is deeper than Trump/Anti-Trump, right? I mean, it’s not just Trump (hell, it wasn’t even Trump until fairly recently) and not just the Republicans (same), but there is bi-partisan support for taking a harder line on China these days. Just because Trump (today) is doing something, that doesn’t automatically make it wrong or ‘anti-intellectualism/Facebook memes’, and this goes for both China and Russia. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day, and you should actually look at the issue instead of jerking your knee because Trump says something.
I do agree that the US pulling out of the TPP was a mistake, but then I think our overly long pivot to Asia, promised as far back as Bush II was long overdue and that, basically, we haven’t been paying attention to China for a long time…and that’s hurt us.
I grudgingly agree that Trump’s anti-China rhetoric has value at it’s core. Of course, given Trump’s incoherence, corruption and incompetence, the result is nothing like an effective economic policy and more like schoolyard shit talking and chest puffery.
He’s actually done as much harm as good with his chaotic and stupid rhetoric and changes in stance, going from praising Xi and the CCP to hammering them. Hell, even his own faithful sometimes can’t keep up with what they are supposed to be parroting today, depending on the latest tweet.
If Biden wins and has support of a Democratic congress (house and senate), I do hope that he re-introduces the TPP and manages to pass an effective economic policy that limits China’s belligerence, globally.
When Biden wins I’m fairly sure he will, as he’s more inclined to multi-lateral agreements than Trump and also I think see’s the value. My hope is Biden will continue a hard line against China…that’s my one worry. But I’m voting for the man regardless, as anything will be better than what we have now.
Frightening, isn’t it. That a consumer commodity company is able to maintain and deploy what is essentially a labor army-at-the-ready, for a product that is not in any way critical to human survival or negatively impact quality of life if its release is delayed for 3-6 months, or even a year. Corporate profits are more important that human life and there are nations around the globe willing to submit their own citizens to chattel status in order to accommodate the mega-corp demands. Apple in China is such an example. Based on reporting, Amazon in America is not much different.
The Apple iPhones are assembled in an enormous factory in Shenzen, operated by Hon Hai Precision (better known as Foxconn). It’s a contract manufacturing company that makes electronics for various companies including, I think, Dell, HP and Cisco. You perceive the employees of these factories as “chattel” but from my understanding, many of the people who work in these factories do so because they want to; these jobs pay well and the long hours allow them to save more. The dormitories where these people are housed on-site allow the employees to spend less on housing and travel costs, and also help them to save more.
Yeah this. I think in the abstract I can agree with some of the actual actions against China. But the reasoning behind them was based on a sheer ignorance of economics, geopolitics, and good old fashioned bigotry. And have helped to perpetuate some of these myths, including the American worker blaming currency manipulation or whatever on exploitative labor laws and insufficient social security in the US.
No doubt this is true. No less true are reports of workers committing suicide in those working conditions. If I’m not mistaken, some of these factories had to install nets to prevent people jumping to their deaths from the roof.
Yes, they’ve stolen tech and secrets from the rest of the world, just like the US stole technology for its own patents from Europe back in the late 19th and early 20th century. I’m not saying it’s right, but most countries tolerate corporate theft as long as their companies aren’t the ones being thieved.
One of the few things I supported Trump on - and what I feel Obama, Bush, Clinton, and others should have been more forceful about - is confronting China on making access to its markets conditional on essentially handing over access to its technology, which enables rampant theft.
The problem is that there’s been absolutely nothing in terms of strategy except for trash talk and idiotic sanctioning, which includes declaring war on other trading partners. We could have used our position and our trade relationship as leverage on a handful of issues. We could have coordinated with other trading partners, who have similar concerns, to confront China. Instead, we’ve come away from these past 4 years looking like we’re barking mad.
As for the topic, all I can say is that de-coupling is not only not in our, our anyone’s, long term interests, but it is also dangerous. We’ve already observed how the failure to coordinate a global response to a pandemic can have dire consequences. Yes, China’s guilty as charged: they covered up the initial waves of outbreak in Wuhan, but they also did so against the backdrop of growing antipathy between China and the West. It should be noted that COVID-19 isn’t nearly as bad as pandemics can get, and we’ve not likely seen the last pandemic, either. Moreover, pandemics are going to pale in comparison to global climate change and its devastating effects, which will probably become more frequent and more severe over the next 10-15 years.
One of the legacies of the years immediately after the close of World War Two was a global order based much more on international cooperation, as opposed to competition. While it’s true that the US and USSR were intense and dangerous competitors, there were outlets through which diplomacy could be facilitated. Trump is not just antagonizing a rising global competitor; he’s also weakening those diplomatic channels and outlets which have provided us with some stability, even if it’s imperfect.
World Wars I and II were the result of international competition and the decline of cooperation. Global resources and wealthy are inevitably going to be distributed unevenly. With trade, countries can reduce those imbalances. With competition (hence, decoupling), powers compete to see who gets to corner the market on resources, and it often results in countries using their resource control to inflict damage on another. Over time, war is the inevitable result.
Yes exactly. I think I can agree that the CCP has done a great job in setting up manufacturing in China, but its record on human rights and coercion is abysmal. The world may have overlooked this in the past, but the CCP cannot expect to keep bullying the world whether it be Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, Tibet, India …
Moreover, just like China disrupted manufacturing in US and Europe, it should expect that the same will happen to it. Just like the rust belts of US, there will be rust belts in China too as it becomes a more advanced Economy and more knowledge driven rather than manufacturing driven. You can see that in Japan where they moved on from low value added manufacturing.
It’s not necessarily that it’s Trump, it’s that trump is living in the 90’s and actually rehashing old democrat talking points of that time. But it’s now 30 years later and the global supply chain has shifted exactly due to republican ideals of the 90’s.
America needs a strategy to deal with China, and Trump is no strategist. In fact, he’s The opposite
I wanted to say the same thing- I loathe Trump and I don’t think I agree with his reasons for going to the mat with China, but I do agree that we’d let too much slide for too long, with regards to a whole raft of issues, from human rights to IP protection.
I’ve mentioned that I’m in pharmaceutical development & manufacturing. Imagine my surprise when I found out the API for a product I had in P3 was readily available in China. OK, I wasn’t actually that surprised. But still…