Charlie Munger on Economics (pdf)
tilsonfunds.com
tilsonfunds.com
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4669
"You've got to have models in your head," he explained, "and you've got to array your experience-both vicarious and direct-on this latticework of models."
I don't quite agree with his views on China and free trade: I don't think it matters if America or China or Belize is "1st". What matters is that everyone is objectively better off. Looking at things on a relative scale rather than an objective one is a sneaky way of turning a non-zero sum game into a zero sum game where there can only be one "1st" or "leader".
The worry is that China will get to #1 economic power while staying non-democratic. The world economic superpower can control/influence a lot of things worldwide, and people worry about a repressive state that can impress it's will upon the world (instead of just it's own people).
Not entirely sure I worry about that. I think that any mass economic progress of the people of China will eventually lead to a self-interested middle class that will simply overwhelm the party's ability to control it.
It's like the RIAA and downloading. The RIAA member companies control the keys to the music kingdom (or at least the mass music kingdom), but they can't resist the overwhelming tide of people that want to download music and play it on any device they own. Eventually China will have it's overwhelming tide moment. Either that or the regime will change itself over time to avoid that moment, until they become what the people want anyway.
They can dump goods. But that just means we'll buy a larger proportion of those goods from China, when China sells them at a loss. The world is a net beneficiary, even if individual producers lose.
They can dump financial products. But again, that just creates a market opportunity -- it's a small transfer of wealth away from whoever else owns those products, but to have a big influence, they'd also have to have a big portfolio, so they would bear a large fraction of the cost.
China could try to sell shoddy goods. But we'd just learn not to buy them.
China could raise tariffs. But that would just force them to invest more in domestic production while hurting their own economy.
Trade wars are not worth their cost. They aren't winnable either, unless someone has overwhelming scale, overwhelming speed, or overwhelming patience.
Going beyond that, they do seem to have fewer qualms about dealing with individuals like Mugabe, or the government of Sudan, since promoting human rights isn't really high up on their agenda.
My hope is that once enough people in China start to get enough money, they'll start wanting a better deal in terms of the distribution of power.