Comment by echelon | Hacker News Reader

Comment by echelon | Hacker News Reader

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America is doing just fine.

The past five years were enough to teach the West to pull out of China and move manufacturing and investment dollars to India, Vietnam, and Mexico.

Mexico is going to be the near-shoring super hub for America, and Texas is going to be an incredible beneficiary of that switch. Many analysts are saying this will push Texas GDP over that of California.

China didn't have enough time to develop a strong domestic consumer base, and now it's seeing a pull back from international buyers as it simultaneously has to contend with massive economic issues at home.

America, meanwhile, has a ten-plus year lead on semiconductors and the burgeoning AI field. It basically got to reap the upside of cheap Chinese manufacturing while it lasted and keep all the best for itself. Now it's actively re-configuring the world's supply chains. You can see America making big changes to worldwide shipping and energy, too. Even OPEC is powerless to control pricing now. And as an added bonus, America feels re-invigorated by competition and is pushing itself to work harder.

I wouldn't shed a single tear for America. It got exactly what it wanted and is moving on from the relationship.

> America is doing just fine.

Compared to what? China is building thousands of kilometers of high speed rail seemingly every year. They’re expanding their power through trade agreements rather than military force. They can manufacture whatever they want.

From where I am sitting it looks like China keeps growing while the US declines. Our economy is so broken people can’t afford rent, school and medical debt are skyrocketing, our planes keep falling apart, we have the highest prison population ever, mass shootings keep happening, and more and more Americans are living in cars.

I think it only looks fine to us because we’re too xenophobic to look outside our borders and see how different things could be.

> From where I am sitting it looks like China keeps growing while the US declines

That just sounds like you're ignorant about what is happening in China.

The economy is in perilous shape after they allowed a completely unregulated financial sector to finance the property sector. Now there are major contagion fears as well as what the impact to consumers will be given 70% of household wealth comes from property.

Combined with a very low birth rate, rapid ageing and decreasing manufacturing competitiveness due to high costs the country is in serious trouble. Far worse than the US.

> The economy is in perilous shape

I've heard their economy is in perilous shape for years now. The people speaking of the 'coming collapse of china's economy' seem just like perma-bears here.

These assumptions have shown to be wrong, time and time again, but surely the collapse is coming right, if we believe hard enough?

Agreed. I think there’s a lot of people in the US that want to hear stories of China's failure, so the stories are written. Even if they do have a recession, that’s not the end of the world for any other major power it won’t be for China either.

And how many times has the US economy faltered? Most recently 2000, 2008, 2020. And yet we’re “doing fine” but when China’s economy has trouble it’s somehow a sign of China’s failure. I think western reports of China’s failure sell newspapers, but China’s done pretty well for itself the last 20 years. I suspect they will navigate through this recession no worse than western powers have time and time again. According to Wikipedia the US has had as many as 48 recessions. That’s not what led to our present stagnation.

Irresponsible financial sector constantly crashing the economy with their unbacked loans? Insufficient birth rates causing devastating demographical changes in nations, from young economically active workers into retired geriatric population which demands extremely costly healthcare and welfare? The inevitable mass immigration that supposedly solves the demographic problem but ends up creating numerous new ones?

Am I reading this right? By that logic the entire western developed world has been dead and buried for a long time now.

> China is building thousands of kilometers of high speed rail seemingly every year.

Many analysts state this has been overbuilt to the point of being gross malinvestment [1-6, etc]. All of those miles require tremendous and costly annual upkeep, and the ridership numbers won't adequately subsidize these costs.

> They’re expanding their power through trade agreements rather than military force. They can manufacture whatever they want.

The results of this remain to be seen. eg. they're dumping cheap EVs on Europe because their domestic market is saturated for Chinese products; meanwhile, the West is pulling back from trade.

> From where I am sitting it looks like China keeps growing while the US declines.

The US is hardly declining. US GDP growth is an astounding 6%, which is almost unprecedented for a developed economy. The rest of your assessment feels like progressive political talking points. Moderates and conservatives would feel very differently.

> we’re too xenophobic

It's xenophobic to have an ill outlook on the Chinese economy? What if one maintains a positive outlook on the Indian, Vietnamese, and Mexican economies? Or Taiwanese? Is that xenophobic?

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/are-chinas-high-speed-t...

[2] https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Caixin/China-s-railway-inv...

[3] https://www.ft.com/content/a9337b06-fe20-11e0-a1eb-00144feab...

[4] https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/chinas-high-speed-rai...

[5] https://www.eurasiantimes.com/a-whopping-900b-debt-chinas-on...

[6] https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Transportation/China-Railwa...

India, Vietnam, and Mexico will be the new China, you only need to give them a couple of decades of free IP.

What a colonist mindset to think those countries aren't able to take advantage of free learning and move on by themselves.

Their overtures towards India are especially interesting. India was once the crown jewel of the british empire, they achieved their independence not even a century ago and have since developed into a nuclear power capable of putting man-made objects on the moon.

India is not stupid and I'm willing to bet Mexico and Vietnam aren't either. They'll only be too happy to accept western money in order to further industrialize and strengthen themselves.

> What a colonist mindset

I know this isn't Reddit, but can you show your work here? Why are you jumping to such wild conclusions on HN?

The expectations that those countries won't be able to take on US like China is doing right now, and be forever slaves of whatever US economy requires of them.

I think you need to re-read my comment. I don't know what you're on about.

These countries are on a rapid rise, fueled by their own domestic growth. None of them are subjugated to the US or the West. Lots of new factories are being built and investors are now pouring in capital.

America has elected to trade more closely. It would be stupid not to.

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