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Comment by erdevs | Hacker News Reader

It seems to me that China outplayed the West here by a wide margin.

For some reason, the West has let China get away with extremely protectionist trade policies the likes of which no one else in the world would dare even attempt. I think this was a combination of fear that isolating China vs creating a high degree of economic interdependence could lead to war down the line, and a lack of control over Western companies who sought to break into China.

The situation today is deeply concerning. I think Western nations need to take dramatic action to curb / disincent China's protectionist policies and let their market open up to the rest of the world. If they won't truly do so, then the West needs to respond in kind.

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Don't forget the USA's ace in the hole for brewing civil unrest in other countries: Hollywood. (I'm being mordant here; not advocating for international psy-ops.)

American media project a depiction of life that is very attractive by design, and this raises expectations among consumers of this media. If Chinese people were not aware of the lifestyles of westerners, the Chinese government would be under less pressure to improve standards of living. And yes everyone in every country knows that popular culture depicts dreams and aspirations rather than reality, but even with this discounting of what people in the developing world see they become aware of the quality of life in the west.

This causes an expectations revolution that is putting tremendous pressure on the Chinese government, which is not necessarily a bad thing but can cause society to destabilize if growth stops.

I just saw the new Star Wars -- cofinanced by (e:) Alibaba films. In it, one of the moral cruxes of the main story was that the crew needed 'Unity'. I saw this as a subtle shift from american 'Freedom'. There's a <plot point, not super spoilery> point where some 'good guys' are being held prisoner. In any red-blooded American Hollywood Film, this would lead to 'GIVE US OUR FREEDOM' type resistance. In this movie, it led to 'WE NEED UNITY' resistance.

Maybe I am reading too much in to it, but it felt like a shift influenced by the additional target market of the East, and I don't see Hollywood as a source of affecting moral/civic unrest.

"Maybe I am reading too much in to it...."

No, i don't think that you're reading too much into it. In fact, i like your analysis. I'll have to rewatch it, again. LOL

especially concerning "unity" vs. "FREEDOMMM!"

Is that a Helldivers reference?

Do you by any chance mean Star Trek and Alibaba films?

Probably. This wouldn't be a new theme for Star Trek.

Yes, thank you for pointing that out, edited my post.

e: Augh, I missed changing the Star Wars -> Star Trek edit and now I can't edit; I have permanently lost nerd cred for making that mixup ;_;

May the force live long and prosper with you :)

Thank you. I haven't seen the new Star Trek movie, but I have seen the new Star Wars movie so I was so very confused.

Independence Day, a blue-blooded American Hollywood Film if there ever was one, is also all about unity.

Think you mean red-blooded.

"Ordinary People" is a blue-blooded American Hollywood film.

That would be my mistake -- I said blue-blooded in my original post and I meant red-blooded as you have pointed out.

>In it, one of the moral cruxes of the main story was that the crew needed 'Unity'. I saw this as a subtle shift from american 'Freedom'.

Teamwork is a huge theme in countless Hollywood movies. A rag tag group of misfits who has to overcome their differences and learn to work together is a classic movie trope.

I don't think this has anything do with trying to appeal to Chinese audiences.

Less complex (and less overall) dialogue designed to make it easier to translate is an actual example of trying to succeed in China.

Certainly there is teamwork in many films, but I feel in traditional films that teamwork is to work towards the common goal of 'freedom' (abstractly). In this Star Trek movie, it came down to a struggle of power vs (explicitly) "unity". I.e., bad guy was against the idea of Unity. So in American films, unity is used as a tool to the end goal of freedom, whereas in this film the struggle was towards the ultimate goal of unity.

But that's one of the central themes of Star Trek. The Federation is explicitly about unity, not necessarily freedom. The Federation has been accessed of being an essentially communist government over the years.

The film was written by long time fan of the series, so one of the central themes of the series being highlighted in the film is unsurprising.

I sincerely doubt it has anything to do with China.

Unity vs. Chaos, with a preference for the former, is a common and recurring them in American film and television which has not infrequently featured in the Star Trek franchise. Freedom vs. authority/conformity, with the preference for the former, is also a common and recurring theme in American film and TV which has not infrequently featured in the Star Trek franchise, and, yes, the two themes do have tension with each other (a tension which is, itself, another common and recurring theme in American film and television which has not infrequently featured in the Star Trek franchise.)

Then again, Hollywood is now increasingly dependent on China, increasingly tailors film to the Chinese market and cultural demands, and is taking more and more financing from China:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/21/words-...

http://fortune.com/hollywood-film-financing/

https://next.ft.com/content/2cb93908-2c65-11e6-bf8d-26294ad5...

Few films (34) can be shown in China each year so being selected is a thing which some go for and others ignore. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/china-film-import-quot...

Why is it a problem if China develops a higher GDP than the US. Its not a problem for the people. It might be a problem to politicians that want to tell a story, but wishing china to do worse economically is truly backwards. If china comes out with better technology than the us, better products and services, cheaper and all that, the whole world gets better. If you dont believe that, then you must for the sake of consistency think that products that come out of the us into other countries are vultures in nature and draining in economic terms.

A more mature approach would be to think what to learn and do(or not do) when someone is showing great signs of progress. Getting more products from China makes the whole richer. China's protectionis policies are probably harming them more than helping them, why play in the same game.

China's GDP compared to it's population is interesting. 3-4 times the population of the US but 80% of the GDP. To me it only seems natural that they will eventually overtake the United States in GDP. India should too, as should the EU

It's hardly that simple. China/Korea/Thai/Vietnam/India... were economically at the same level at the turn of WWII - India was probably in better shape. Now India is comparable only to S-Saharan Africa (and other S.Asian countries), in terms of educational attainment/malnourishment ...

Systems matter; it's not surprising that deeply colonized countries remain basket cases. It's likely that China will be the last nation to "re-industrialize" in the near term.

The EU has the biggest GDP in the world btw.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nomi...

China is repressive and has very low standards for human rights. If China becomes more powerful they may decide to conquer the US properly. This may be along way off but this is the fear that's behind not wanting China to surpass the US economically.

Chinese civilization is different from western civilization, specially in its habit to absorb other culture, instead of conquering them. China had a Mongol dynasty, a Manchu dynasty. But it never rode to the other side of the world to force remote populations to change their religion or political system.

Neither had Japan.

This interests me. Do you know of any good books, articles, or other sources I could learn more about this topic? Specifically your first sentence.

https://archive.org/details/problemofchina00russ Not exactly answers the question, but I quite like Russel's view on this.

Any book on the long history of China would do, I'm not sure which one in English should be recommended.

What do you think of the U.S.'s record for human rights? To be fair, the U.S. has done a much better job of keeping many of those incidents (Gitmo or elsewhere) secret until fairly recently.

> What do you think of the U.S.'s record for human rights?

The U.S. is far from guilt free.

At the time that the US was developing, it also had extremely low standards for human rights.

But as the US prospered, the Civil Rights movement kicked in. So perhaps the same will happen in China.

That isn't true at all. The US had extremely high standards for human rights, just much lower standards for slaves, but the framework and standards already existed for post civil war and the civil rights movement. As far as human rights go, China is somewhere before the Magna Carta in western civilization.

>The US had extremely high standards for human rights, just much lower standards for slaves

Were slaves not human back then? GP is right: the human rights standard was appalling, and this is before considering the Trail of Tears and other small-pox-related incidents

High standard human rights existed in the west, they just weren't equally applied. In China, human rights are equally applied, just at a very low standard.

So the west only had to apply what human rights already existed universally to "develop," and there was already moral pressure to do so from unfairness. China already has "fairness", but no where to go after that; there is definitely no moral pressure from within to do better.

I'm not certain that there were (to a modern eye) a high standard of human rights for anyone. Treatment of slaves and the lack of women's rights are well known examples, but there are a large number of historical practices that paint a pretty inhumane society, including punishments (e.g. the stocks), amusements (e.g. gouging aka rough and tumble), and community standards for the treatment of children (`beat the devil out of them` was serious, and not at all metaphorical).

Maybe look at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_human_rights

> While belief in the sanctity of human life has ancient precedents in many religions of the world, the idea of human rights, that is, the notion that a human being has a set of inviolable rights simply on grounds of being human, began during the era of renaissance humanism in the early modern period. The European wars of religion and the civil wars of seventeenth-century England gave rise to the philosophy of liberalism and belief in human rights became a central concern of European intellectual culture during the eighteenth-century Age of Enlightenment. These ideas of human rights lay at the core of the American and French Revolutions which occurred toward the end of that century. Democratic evolution through the nineteenth century paved the way for the advent of universal suffrage in the twentieth century. Two world wars led to the creation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

> The post-war era saw human rights movements for special interest groups such as feminism and the civil rights of African-Americans. The human rights of members of the Soviet bloc emerged in the 1970s along with workers' rights in the West. The movement quickly jelled as social activism and political rhetoric in many nations put it high on the world agenda.[1] By the 21st century, Moyn has argued, the human rights movement expanded beyond its original anti-totalitarianism to include numerous causes involving humanitarianism and social and economic development in the Developing World.[2]

> Some notions of righteousness present in ancient law and religion is sometimes retrospectively included under the term "human rights". While Enlightenment philosophers suggest a secular social contract between the rulers and the ruled, ancient traditions derived similar conclusions from notions of divine law, and, in Hellenistic philosophy, natural law.

One can say "human rights" and still not have accomplished the goal yet, but if one cannot say "human rights" at all, there is no goal in sight. The Chinese media always complains that "human rights" is a western-biased concept, not appropriate for China, and at least we can agree on the first part. Human rights was a concept in the west, even if it had flaws, it was never even a concept in China (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_values).

Actually this isn't true at all then. By your logic, China also have an extremely high standard for human rights. Just a cursory look at the Chinese constitution shows how much they value equality.

And surely, the rich and connected people in China have those rights. They are treated fairly by the system and society.

It's just those poorer people that are hurt, but hey, the framework for it still exists.

China's constitution is all about equality, free speech, etc...but China's system is not based on constitutional law so they just ignore it. You know that.

People all have the same standards enshrined in the political system, but it is a low bar, and everyone makes out in the economic system instead. It's basically what a libertarian society would look like if they kept the government to a minimum (sans the occasional persecution of a dissident).

> If China becomes more powerful they may decide to conquer the US properly.

That's utterly hilarious. If there's a world in which that's even remotely possible, we'll all be long, long dead by the time it happens.

I wouldn't be so sure.

China's GDP per capita is currently about 14% of the United States [1]. That's roughly the same ratio that Japan faced in 1960, yet within 30 years Japan overtook the US in GDP per capita [2].

My view is that China has a number of economic and demographic disadvantages that mean in 30 years China is 'only' likely to reach 30-50% of US GDP per capita. But with a population projected to be 3 times the US [3], China's overall GDP will be greater than the US. In 30 years.

And once that happens, how long will it take for China's military power to exceed the United States? You might be dead, but your grandchildren will certainly see it happen.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(no...

[2] Based on the Google graph when you search "Japan GDP per capita", etc.

[3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projections_of_population_gr...

First, the post I responded to did not claim that our militaries could reach parity. It claimed that China could conquer the US. That's impossible, preposterous even, and the only thing that could change that is the singularity, and if that happens all bets are off.

Second, even reaching parity is an immensely daunting proposition. If China were to start building ships and aircraft, the US would respond in kind. Right now there's a lot of overhead and waste in the procurement process, that waste would disappear if shit suddenly got real. Sure, we 'only' have 20 carrier groups right now, but there's no reason we can't have 40.

There's two main force multipliers I see that we have that China will never be able to catch up with us on. First, training and experience. The reason we keep a small military manpower-wise is because every US soldier is extremely well-trained. If China conscripted a percentage of their population, they could instantly have a larger army, but that army would then need to be trained in how to conduct modern warfare.

Second, alliances with other countries. The best air-to-air missile right now is the Meteor, it's being developed in Sweden and sold throughout Europe. If China started rising militarily, the US and Europe would immediately start cooperating to counter it by sharing technology.

The US has an enormous amount invested in its military dominance, it will not give that up at any cost. China could not reach parity slowly, as it would never catch up, and it can't reach it quickly, because we'd notice and respond appropriately. It would be such a huge drain on their economy that they'd abandon the effort.

The Soviets never even came close to parity in conventional force projection. The Chinese wouldn't either in a strategic arms race. Even if they did, they'd still never in a million years be able to conquer the US. As well try to conquer the Sun.

> First, the post I responded to did not claim that our militaries could reach parity. It claimed that China could conquer the US.

For China to some day have the ability to conquer the US, wouldn't they first have to reach parity? Seems to me the post was implicitly claiming that the China's military could reach parity with the United States. But I agree that the focus of the argument is on exceeding the US military power.

The generals of the First World War had training and experience, but technological change meant that training was useless and they had to re-learn how to fight on the battlefield. Future technology will have the same effect - for example, a swarm of drones might be more capable than a manned fighter aircraft. Air superiority might come down to who can write the better drone software, or perhaps simply who has the most drones. The old investment in manned fighter aircraft would count for nothing.

I agree that the US alliances with other countries is a benefit that China will not have. But China has its own unique benefit - its manufacturing industry. It already far exceeds the US in ability to mass produce smartphones. Couldn't it one day churn out military robots at a far greater rate than the US and Germany combined?

The Soviets never came close to achieving economic parity with the United States. A better analogy would be Britain in the 19th century - it lost its military dominance as the US grew its economy to be much larger than the British economy. In the 21st century China will do to the US what the US did to Britain the 19th century.

My logic is simple: (a) in 30 years China's economy will be bigger than the US economy; (b) in 60 years China's economy will be double the US economy; (c) A country will lose its military superiority to another country if that other country can afford to spend twice as much on its military.

None of these three statements seems particularly controversial to me.

> For China to some day have the ability to conquer the US, wouldn't they first have to reach parity?

Sure. But it's not enough.

To conquer a country you have to invade it. To invade it you have to move soldiers to it. A lot of them. China could destroy our entire navy and air force and still not be able to conquer us.

This is the reason we used nuclear weapons against Japan in WW2 rather than try to invade it. We could have, but the amount of resources and blood it would have taken was extreme. An operation of that scale conducted across an ocean has only been successful once, and that's because we had a friendly country to establish a base on. (DDay)

Should the Chinese want to invade us, their only real option would be through Mexico. No amount of conventional military dominance can overcome the sheer impossibility of trying to invade a country by sea. And the US and Canada are too close for them to go that route. Invading Canada would be just as hard as invading the US. They could maybe try overland across Russia, Alaska, and Canada, but that would be just as hard as an amphibious assault.

Should the US see that China was gearing up for such a plan, we'd send our army there to rebuff the attempt, ignoring Mexican sovereignty if we had to.

Without troops on the ground, there is no conquest. They could conceivably beat us in conventional conflict given a serious enough advantage, but they could never actually invade us, so complete neutralization is impossible.

It does not look like Japan ever overtook the US in GDP per capita: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

Yes they did: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

But it doesn't really matter whether Japan got to 105% or 95% of US GDP in 1990 - my point that China could get to 30-50% of US GDP in 30 years stands.

The US has a horrible human rights history. The country started with genocide of native americans. It enslaved and murdered millions of africans. It still has very racist tendencies. It killed several million koreans, vietnamese and cambodians (indirectly). Then there is Iraq and Afghanistan. There are a lot of really horrible things the US did that is on par with the Nazis and the worse we've seen from many other countries. The US is good at hiding or ignoring its atrocities. I don't think China is better or worse. But I don't see why it should be vilified when the US (and many other 1st world countries) have done much worse things to each other and to the 3rd world. In fact, I think all 3rd world countries should grow their internal markets in a similar way until they can become 1st world countries.

I have to say this is an insane fear that does not reflect the world as is, or if it where true, it would have terrible implications.

First of all, China and the US, besides their rivalry, are huge economic partners: china and the US trade from each other a lot. Either of them going into military conflict with the other would mean massive economic losses. Im not saying it cant happen, but it cannot be the goal to get richer so in the end you can get poorer.

Ofc is reasonable to think that being an economic power gives you also political power, and as an American you can perceive that the US benefits from that position today and doesnt want to lose it to China.

I would say that first of all, most of U.S. intervention in other countries has cost dearly both for the intervened countries and to the american taxpayer(and sometimes citizen or soldier). China as well as the US are a problem in that regard. Its true that it could have negative consequences, as it does for the US to have that power, but it feels to me secondary to economic power, and more relevant to how international institutions should work.

In any case, China doesnt have to surpass the US to do this, as today it already has a lot of questionable policies(like being an ally to north korea, or getting into borderline military conflicts for sea territory).

Why was this downvoted? It's a perfectly good question.

"Why is it a problem if China develops a higher GDP than the US"

That isn't the issue.

The issue is protectionist policies and direct interference by the state in all sectors.

They can do that if they want, but we need to slap tariffs on their products and ban some Chinese companies from selling in the West.

Why, the US is richer for being able to import Chinese products. The victims of the proteccionist policies are the chinese people, that are forced to consume worse products, or at a higher price, or paid with their taxes.

Its like saying "my neighbor is stabbing himself, we should stab ourselves so they learn!"

Your comment sounds like it's coming from ten years ago or something.

China may (or may not, for all I know) have beaten the West in the game of getting the technology it wants but the country has enough structural problems that it's chances of getting ahead of the West broadly are looking very dim.

Problems: Horrific pollution, huge loans to inefficient state-run industries, massive real state and infrastructure mal-investment and bubbles, losing conventional factory jobs to even lower waged centered without gaining better jobs in compensation, having a first world demographic structure (lots of old people) without a first world standard of living, a government that's resorting to repression and ideology to solve problems and so-doubling down on all mistakes, the falsification of statistics can barely conceal an economy in stasis, etc.

So, there's little to fear from a Chinese economic "juggernaut" but the decline of China poses serious problems - especially, it seems to be what fueling the huffing and puffing over the South China sea.

Yup! Additionally the Chinese government is not a smart investor, and that's led to overcapacity. Eventually these bad investments will punish China, but it make take some time.

http://www.economist.com/news/business/21696552-chinas-indus... http://www.economist.com/news/business/21693573-chinas-exces...

I saw a different thread about how China embraced mobile payments. One of the benefits was a consumer could pay a farmer directly using the mobile payment.

My first thought following reading that was "Yeah, and then the Farmer transfers that money into the stock market, and creates the bubble effect that is only corrected by direct intervention not allowing it to go down naturally."

    > Horrific pollution

Like how the US had horrible pollution during and after the industrial revolution and never got anywhere?

China's going to get their Clean Air Act. Just give it some time.

I'm more concerned about soil pollution and sinking water tables in the most fertile regions. Air could be cleaned up in a week, but this can't.

Improper irrigation can even lead to salts rising up to the soil surface and making it permanently infertile barring major earth works. Falling water tables can allow the ground to compress (now-empty pores deflate) and significantly lower the ground's ability to carry groundwater (as has happened in California).

Some damage is permanent, and we were not capable of the worst back then.

My list wasn't about China being evil or "worse than the US". I wish them well but the combination of problems they false has sufficient to make their economy stall. And with a stalled economy, China will have a hard time affording a Clean Air Act, adding to the vicious cycle they are experiencing.

Further, repression also make the equivalent of a Clean Air Act hard. The pattern currently is the central authorities issue a call to protect the environment (usually kind of ad-hoc) but local authorities ignore it and no one can complain because all the authorities are beyond criticism.

Just like the way you have the President start an anti-corruption campaign but the President's cronies exempt.

China boosters for years said these problems didn't matter. Maybe they didn't matter for those years but now, they are here in spades.

The funny thing is that even your comment sounds like coming from ten years ago. I remember reading pundits talk about the coming collapse of China for almost 20 years now.

Protectionist trade policies are common in Japan too. Ford quit the Japanese market after less than 5000 units sold in 2015.

http://www.iol.co.za/motoring/industry-news/why-arent-foreig...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ian-fletcher/japan-the-forgott...

"Protectionist trade policies are common in Japan too...."

There are advantages to the way Asian economists do it. For example, not only in Japan, but especially in Korea, cell phones were standard even by the mid-90's....EVERYONE had one. And the rates were quite reasonable, too. (No contracts, either. IfIRememberRight.) But there are(/were) disadvantages to Asian Tiger economics too. After the Asian bubble burst, the Korean Wan [SouthKorean money] depreciated to the point that USArmy Sergeants were trying to buy cars (even Fords, not just Kias and Daewoos) made (or rather bought) in Korea. (The US Dollar-to-Wan rate was so out of wack that it was still more economical to buy AND ship a car back to the US across the Pacific on a boat. Unfortunately emissions standards were different; Korean cars didn't pass EPA muster.) ~circa 1998

Protectionism in my opinion is key to helping an economy that is developing to catch up.

What Should happen instead is quid pro quo trade agreements. But in Google and Uber's case Chinese industry isn't exploiting the US market, so the US companies have no right to complain.

China exchanged trillions of goods at below market rates due to games with their exchange rate. This worked because the government does not care about it's populace and can extract a lot of value from an oppressed population. The populace benefited from increasing purchasing power though far less and far slower than most developing nations.

I would say the US and communist party members got a great deal and the Chinese population is better off though still being stepped on.

Not sure why you are downvoted, this is pretty much spot on. The artificially low renminbi has been driving Chinese exports since the 90s and will probably continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile the Chinese people got rapid industrialization at the cost of by and large living in polluted filth and crowded cities, and their per-capita GDP, which is a fairly good measure of the wealth of the median citizen, is still middling-to-terrible despite their high overall GDP.

This has been a great deal for the western citizen, who have been exchanging tons of currency for cheap goods(thanks to the low exchange rate), especially US citizens who have had their government's borrowing costs financed by the very money sent over there to buy things with. Not so great of a deal for the average Chinese, in comparison to what they might have had as a more westernized country.

Edit: Let's not even talk about the demographic collapse happening as a result of the one child policy. It will make any demographic problems in the west look like child's play.

You could also tell the very opposite story. In the last around 20 years, the poor and middle class in china greatly benefited from the economic growth, while the poor and middle class in the west didn't benefit at all or even had a wage cut if you look at inflation adjusted wages. China is hardly a developing nation anymore.

In economics you end up with a reversion to the mean over time. China was in a very bad state though terrible management over the preceding hundreds of years, so catching up was rather simple. US, is coming down from being the only modern state that was not destroyed by WWII.

US lower and middle class benefited from cheap goods, and suffered from continued automation and imports. However, the US produces more goods now than at any point in it's history so you can't really blame things on a lack of manufacturing.

IMO, I would blame 5 primary factors, massive undocumented population suppressing wages, developed economy making growth harder, tax policy's that harm workers directly and indirectly, unions shrinking, and rapid automation continuously disrupting the economy.

The last time China had a huge trade imbalance with a country resulted in the Opium Wars.

I can see why China is so keen on improving their military now.

But back then China wanted nothing from the rest of the world EXCEPT its silver. So in comes Opium, and then the Opium wars.

These days, I think it is a bit better. At least China wants our airplanes/jet engines. And the ruling class is totally vested in overseas real estate. Military wars are just going to be bad for business at that point.

The interests for both parties are now interlocked and the stakes are very high. So things are not that simple. Change will be gradual till a tipping point.

> For some reason, the West has let China get away with extremely protectionist trade policies the likes of which no one else in the world would dare even attempt.

I always assumed that this was allowed because in turn, China gave American companies access to very, very cheap manufacturing labour.

> For some reason, the West has let China get away with extremely protectionist trade policies the likes of which no one else in the world would dare even attempt

The reason might be deindustrialization of the west coupled by an exploding globsl consumer goods market and large (and growing) home market. China effectively made itself the factory of the west, and a highly desirable market as well.

The TPP is an attempt to deal with China because the west can't directly confront China with a tit-for-tat strategy for practical purposes: Western countries would need to rebuild and retool consume-goods factories at a high cost that the profit-maximizing corps don't want to shoulder

Maybe it's simpler than that. Maybe Western men just like Asian women. Love after all, trumps everything.

Protectionist policies hurt the "protected" countries the most.

Smoot-Hawley

No, the West does not need to respond in kind. Unilateral free trade is better than tit-for-tat escalations. Let them protect their own; in the long run we'll be better off for allowing free-trade even when our counterparties do not.

> It seems to me that China outplayed the West here by a wide margin.

Don't worry, the game is not over yet.

>For some reason, the West has let China get away with extremely protectionist trade policies the likes of which no one else in the world would dare even attempt.

Yes. But this could be changed by Trump in one day. (Sorry, I know that this is an extremely liberal board).

Chinese don't believe in win-win. They believe in win-lose. Thats great but in my experience there is a point where you run out of stupid people to screw over.

Also, it is difficult to do business with Chinese. Why? Because a lot of their decisions are irrational and it is extremely difficult to have an opponent that does irrational decisions. But this will backfire or is backfirering already. Why? With 10 or 12% growth you can afford to make irrational decisions. But try this at 6,5 or 4 percent growth. Good luck with that.

> Yes. But this could be changed by Trump in one day.

OH really? How will he do that?

Tell them: Look, you can play around with your currency in whatever way you want. But if the trade balance is not balanced, we charge a 10% import tax. Per day. Cumulative.

I think there are many countries that can produce cheap shoes, clothes and electronics. By now all this stuff can already be manufactured in the US again due to automation and robotics (see Adidas producing shoes in Germany AGAIN).

This would be a minor problem for the US but a big problem for China, Germany and Japan.

By the way, I live in China.

> Tell them: Look, you can play around with your currency in whatever way you want. But if the trade balance is not balanced, we charge a 10% import tax. Per day. Cumulative.

Yea, that's not how the world works; the President isn't a CEO.

And watch while we are plunged into a recession due to a huge disruption in global supply chains.

Sorry, but complex problems don't have simple answers. Trump can't unilaterally force China to stop its protectionism, at least not without inflicting significant hurt on the American economy.

How do you think people will react to a 10% increase in prices for almost all goods?

"And watch while we are plunged into a recession due to a huge disruption in global supply chains."

WHAT supply chain? There is NO supply chain anymore. JIT (Just-In-Time) inventory has been replaced by BLTN (Better-Late-Than-Never) and AGNM (Ain't-Got-No-More) inventory.

Went to a large box store on the weekend. They had empty containers marked "Display" on the shelves. Two different employees explained that I should put empty containers for the desired items in my cart and, upon checking out, they would retrieve a full container of each item "from the back". Both assured me all displayed items were available.

Got my display containers and proceeded to check out. Was informed that two of three displayed items were not available. I suggested to the clerk "So now you'll take these two items off display?" He replied "No, they'll probably be back in stock next week."

I left the store w/o purchasing anything and they'll never see me again.

We may be in a recession right now because we can't buy quality goods AT ALL! I've bought five new fingernail clippers in the last six months and, for God's sake, they won't cut my nails! They're all made in China.

Many, if not most Chinese goods, especially machine tools, remain as they were 14 years ago: low quality and every item different with no standardization. And they've driven many good US manufacturers out of business. Why? Because workers buy shitty tools for one-time use, bill the customer for the work and for the tools and then throw away the tools when they're done. Of course no one's considering the external factors here: cost of shitty tools in poor workmanship, longer production times and accidents.

"How do you think people will react to a 10% increase in prices for almost all goods?"

If it convinces American manufacturers to produce quality products then it's great news.

Your anecdotes are not data.

They're anecdata, the best kind of data for those with an agenda or those without brains.

The evidence is far more than anecdotal. Anyone who is an active tool user could provide more - ask your local mechanic. The experience I describe is almost universal and transcends the term "anecdodal".

Here's some bedside reading:

'What’s in a tool? A case for Made in USA':

http://hackaday.com/2016/01/18/whats-in-a-tool-a-case-for-ma...

Discussion of the same:

https://build.slashdot.org/story/16/01/18/213236/whats-in-a-...

"China & The Decline In Quality (And Soon In Profits)":

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-08-18/china-decline-quali...

And my favorite, just for fun: "Chinese Factory Worker Can't Believe The Shit He Makes For Americans":

http://www.theonion.com/article/chinese-factory-worker-cant-...

I'm not from the US or China.

I think that outside the US, the reputation of US-made good has never been particularly strong. We see US cars, and compare them to Japanese cars and see mostly failings.

So far as Chinese goods go, I have no particular knowledge of wrenches.

However, I'd note that (Chinese made) Apple products are generally of pretty good quality.

I'd also point out that the ZeroHedge article doesn't really make a strong case that quality is decreasing at all. And you realize the Onion is a parody, right?

My point was that _everything_ I could post myself would necessarily be "anecdotal", but that anyone willing to do a google search can find millions of remarks: e.g.,

https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&complete=0&hl=en&...

But you don't need to do that. Instead observe!

Go to a hardware store and try out a few tools from various countries. You'll see what I mean. _Pay_ _attention_ to the world you live in and the tools you and others use every day. In my case, my fingernail clippers failing (not one, but two pair, from different Chinese manufacturers, within weeks of each other) was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Instead of asking me to provide hard statistical evidence on these forums, I expect you internet wunderkinds to write a one-off ML tool to scrape the internet for "anecdotal" evidence, collate it, translate it with your neural net NL software, correlate it, and finally analyze it as your own statistical evidence. Maybe you'd even share it with others, but that isn't necessary.

nl: "I'd also point out that the ZeroHedge article doesn't really make a strong case that quality is decreasing at all.":

I can only assume you read an article other than the one I linked to.

And yes, I intentionally put the Onion article in there, because it is funny. But some people have no sense of humour and are unable to resist pointing out the obvious.

>I've bought five new fingernail clippers in the last six months and, for God's sake, they won't cut my nails! They're all made in China.

I'm just here to help. May I suggest these: https://www.amazon.com/Seki-Edge-Stainless-Fingernail-Clippe...

If your concern is with quality a good place to browse is: https://www.reddit.com/r/BuyItForLife/

Generally you'll have a number of options with pros/cons of each to select from. Often things are a little on the pricier side - but that price is for quality. Not all items are meant "for life" unfortunately, but a good 5-10 years is better than 5-10 weeks.

I have to chime in on those Seki clippers, amazingly better than any I've ever tried, regardless of where they were made.

Sounds like when it was the 60s and Japan was on the rise. It's almost as if, people in the occident have collective amnesia.

The United States is already dealing with economic problems caused by the Chinese trade deficit, which siphons almost as much demand from the economy every year as Obama's 2008 stimulus added in a one-time shot. So it is an interesting question and certainly not one-sided....

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/protectionism-g...

A trade war would theoretically cause a deadweight loss in global GDP, but as long as the US is not at full employment it is likely losses would end up distributed almost entirely on the Chinese side. Domestic losses would only take place after the return to full employment. Restructuring costs would also be imposed disproportionately on China because they'd be the ones dealing with insufficient demand.

Sure, a better alternative from a conventional economic perspective would be having the United States ramp up spending. The problem is that just printing more USD to enable this causes its own set of problems given that the USD is the world's reserve currency. Having the government take on additional interest-bearing debt avoids this problem, but does not seem particularly attractive when the Chinese are the ones who will end up collecting interest on the loan.

Political outcomes? My sense is that we'd see an upsurge in nationalism in China, perhaps more aggression in the South China Seas, but also a rapid collapse in the Chinese economy that would make coming to terms with the trade deficit a political priority. And is it really crazy for the West to demand a level playing field in exchange for its willingness to keep China from economic collapse?

> and having the government take on additional interest-bearing debt instead does not seem particularly attractive when the Chinese are the ones who will end up collecting interest on the loan.

But the Chinese aren't the ones that will end up collecting interest on additional US debt; while they are the biggest current foreign holder of US debt, their total holdings are dropping; they not only aren't the biggest purchaser of new US debt, they aren't even a net purchaser of US debt. (And they are only the biggest foreign holder, most US federal debt is owed to...entities within the US; non-federal US entities hold 4 times as much US debt as China does.)

You're missing the point. The problem isn’t who buys the loans (that is optics). The problem is that you are imposing a long-term tax burden on Americans in order to paper over a structural demand deficit. This is unsustainable and also unfair -- Americans are already paying for the status quo through persistently high unemployment and wage stagnation.

The best solution of course involves China recognizing that persistent trade deficits hurt its trade partners. The problem is that the Chinese political system is its own distributional game, and while there are direct costs for its participants associated with opening up markets and letting foreign businesses compete with domestic ones, there are no costs and only benefits associated with foreign dumping.

> And is it really crazy for the West to demand a level playing field in exchange for keeping China from economic collapse?

I think the US should demand that China reduce restrictions, not that we should increase them.

> government take on additional interest-bearing debt instead does not seem particularly attractive when the Chinese are the ones who will end up collecting interest on the loan

Why not? Personally, I find the obsession with debt entirely counterproductive. If the government can seemingly borrow endless sums of money with incredibly low interest, why not borrow as much as we can?

Especially since, as you said, we could actually benefit from a bit more inflation.

"And watch while we are plunged into a recession due to a huge disruption in global supply chains."

This is false. China is not the sole or important supplier of most things.

Vietname, India etc. are becoming capable of providing labour and supply chain.

A 10% tariff would be fair.

Besides, something needs to be done to balance trade.

Right now China is cheating by claiming they are open, whey they are not.

The West should simply implement tit-for-tat policies.

Vietnam/Thailand are already in the supply chain (where do you think all your cameras/hard disks come from ?). India barely has a manufacturing sector.

Of course. But supply/demand economics means as wages/issues rise in China (i.e. trade war) the rest of Asia, which is rising quickly, picks up the slack.

China has scale, and the right value chains for certain things. But ultimately they are commodities. It's that hard to build simple factories and provide reliable electricity and cheap workers.

Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Vietnam etc. - there's a lot of people there waiting to pick up the slack.

The US does not import a lot of meaningful things from China.

China imports a lot of critical goods from the West, particularly Germany. Also - the trade balance is very lopsided.

A 'trade war' with China would be very painful for China, but the West would hardly skip a beat.

A) Consumer prices would rise a little bit. B) Some plants (smart factories) would open in the US C) Mexico would boon, and so would other areas in Asia.

In the long run, if other places pick up the slack, it would permanently damage China's competitive advantages - whereas Western nations would do just fine, save a few German tool makers.

US economy grew only by 1.3% (as opposed to the expected 2.3%); the news sent XAU and JPY soaring. The silver cloud was that the consumer spending still looked decent; such tariffs without massive structural changes to the US manufacturing will come with a recession.

People don't understand why people manufacture in China - it's less about wages now, and more about logistics. Considering the global decline in demand, it's unlikely US (or any others in S. Asia / Africa) will be able to repeat the China/Asian Tiger story on such a mass scale.

I always wonder who are the idiotic supporters of trump and what were they thing? Now I found one. So trump raises 10% import tax, how will that affect prices and the economy. You are such a genius. The world is a dangerous place because of people like you with half brains.

>So trump raises 10% import tax This was just an example. But it does not matter if 1% or 10%. It is per day. Cumulative. Please look up the word if you don't understand it. It is cumulative until the trade balance is balanced again.

You're only proving his point.

There is a massive amount of US wealth landlocked in China, there's no way a US president is going to risk having China appropriate all that wealth a la Castro. If you really believe Trump will go through with his childish bravado then I feel sorry for you and for all his voters but I get why it has made him popular. When it comes to China it's too late to do anything too drastic to reverse this situation and given the risks involved there probably isn't much will to rock the boat either.

Another way to look at it: if you think Trump won't go through with his insanities, you're not scared enough.

One example: Trump said he would refuse to honor US debts, just as he has successfully refused to honor his own debts so many times. Even the smallest credible threat of devaluing US Treasury bonds would be an economic disaster.

"OH really? How will he do that?"

By slapping tit-for-tat policies.

+ Don't allow Chinese companies to invest in the US. + Control capital + Impose tariffs + Get the US gov to make it impossible for Chinese to do business in the US.

Could be done with the stroke of a pen.

> Because a lot of their decisions are irrational and it is extremely difficult to have an opponent that does irrational decisions.

While I disagree in general, I downvoted because of that statement. The decisions of the Chinese government make sense in context. They are not an irrational actor just because some of us don't understand their motivations, or because they don't align with western interests. The process is obscure, which makes it frustrating, but there is logic and grand strategy involved.

That is true (see infrastructure investments). The irrational decision makers are mainly in private enterprises. In my opinion because they are used to 10% growth. They will have to change or their companies will go belly up.

Many Chinese (both in Private and SOE) are complaining that there is a "downturn" right now. This is NOT a downturn. It will never be 10% growth. They have not realized that the game has changed.

> Why? Because a lot of their decisions are irrational and it is extremely difficult to have an opponent that does irrational decisions.

So if I make business decisions via ouija board or in a cocaine induced rage, I'll have a leg up?

> So if I make business decisions via ouija board or in a cocaine induced rage, I'll have a leg up?

No, but you'll have a job on Wall Street or maybe be a hedge fund manager.

You mistake appetite for risk as irrational. This might be true in some cases but I don't think it is general the same.

I think more of the scorpion and the frog: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scorpion_and_the_Frog

> So if I make business decisions via ouija board or in a cocaine induced rage, I'll have a leg up?

Thomas Schelling's book The Strategy of Conflict has a focus on the ways that people can benefit in a conflict from being, or being perceived as, irrational or constrained in their choices or access to information. Clearly you can't be better off in all areas of life by making irrational or random decisions, but there are some specific situations of conflict where you might be, if others are aware of it.

One familiar example

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_(game)

where if people think you are very irrational, you're likely to win!

Surprisingly, according to game theory yes.

http://lesswrong.com/lw/dc7/nash_equilibria_and_schelling_po...

> (Sorry, I know that this is an extremely liberal board).

Not really on economic policy, based on what I've seen. However, logical thinking is highly valued; that is to say, connecting the dots and backing up your assertions with evidence. Trite, blasé solutions to complex problems will usually earn a down vote on most topics, which is the case here.

Asserting in advance that the board is extremely liberal and will therefore disagree with you based on a difference of opinion is I'm sure reassuring when you are down voted, as it insulates you from any responsibility in putting forth a poorly-considered case. You are just lying to yourself, though.

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