We, as consumers, have done it to ourselves. We've created a monster. Everyone falls in love with their super cheap products that they produce and turns a blind eye to the fact that they are still a communist nation. I know that the international trade game is hardly fair, but the trade deficit between China and the rest of the world, especially the US, is disgusting.
I would love to go on and on ranting about everything else that I hate about the Chinese government like currency fixing, human rights, abysmal industrial/engineering standards, etc., but I've got to get back to work.
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Their population and education level could not have any other form of government. They have a huge surplus of labor, which could sustain every job we can possibly throw at them.
I am a little bit of isolationist, but American economic structure would fail if we didn't export US dollars, because we don't have much else to export.Leave a comment:
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It's both. It's people are a blessing. It's government is a curse. Of course, the huge quantity of people they have is in itself both the problem and the opportunity. The country is so under-developed that it offers huge opportunity for sales of all kinds of products. Yet, it is so backwards and so anti-west that it constantly disregards what we would consider good business ethics and what we consider to be an outright disregard for international law.
The jobs thing is a moot point. There are many, many factors that go into the migration of jobs from rich nations to poor nations. Many of those problems can be traced directly back to minimum wage laws and unions. These practices drive jobs to cheaper labor areas. Also, because of our cost of living in the developed nations, it becomes untenable to manufacture certain items here since people won't buy them if they are too expensive. They'll go right to Wall-mart and buy the cheap crap produced somewhere else. (in other words, we complain incessantly about losing jobs, but we still go buy cheap crap from stores just to save a dollar or two and refuse to buy the stuff made locally. It's our own fault that this happens.)
So, in order to have a level playing field, all countries in the world need to be on a nearly equal footing when it comes to prosperity.
How do you get there? The only way is to allow natural economic forces to rule and for money to flow naturally. It can't be forced without causing massive problems. Unfortunately, governments like China's, always try to manipulate this kind of thing with tariffs and monetary policies that guarantee that they get the best share. These things work, but only in the short term, and they always have unintended negative consequences.
My opinion is that the only way to get China out of the dark ages is to continue to engage them on an economic level. Sooner or later, the people there will become educated enough and have enough access to travel and information that they will realize that they are being oppressed. Only then will the government change.
Russia is also big. It is also under developed. It is a similar situation to China, but not quite as bad except for the fact that they seem to have this national "short mans syndrome" or lack of self worth. They seem to constantly want the world to acknowledge their greatness and they do this by a lot of saber rattling and by acting irrationally in the face of opposition. I think the west has a lot more in common with Russia than it does with China though, so I hope that we can work with them more effectively. Russians, much more than China, respects strength. We cannot be seen to waffle or appear weak. They will go for the jugular if they sense that.
Back to the jobs thing. Again, much of this is way overstated. The jobs we lose are all low-paying jobs that cannot sustain a family. It's work that most westerners would refuse to do except when they are students who need part-time work. What the west gains back is higher paying jobs in technology, accounting, business management, SHIPPING, etc. Just because we pay 1000 workers $1 a day to make a product, doesn't mean that the company who does so isn't hiring local people. They are. My company is US based and we have sites for engineering in many western nations and we have products made in multiple places including China. The majority of family level, high paying jobs, are all based here in the US. There are companies here in the US that couldn't survive without producing their products in cheaper labor markets. So, just to assume that these low paying jobs leaving the west and going to China is a hugely negative thing, is wrong.Leave a comment:
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I'm not nearly versed enough in Global Relations or even really up to date on the friction between China and other surrounding countries, but I'm not a fan of China nor it's foreign policies.
Yes, I believe China hosting the Olympic games was a huge mistake.
Whether or not this will spiral into another war, and lets hope not, I don't know. It's really not just policy, it's a struggle of Ideals. A way of life.Leave a comment:
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Is China a curse or a blessing?
Most western countries' economy have suffered from the exodus of production moved to China. Creating a huge loss of jobs, which is not a benefit to occidental countries. Yesterday's USSR has become today's China. Is there another cold war coming up? China threatens any country that doesn't behave according to its interests. Mega frictions are being exacerbated by last week's approval of US sales of weapons to Taiwan. Countries welcoming the Dalai Lama fall onto China's black list...
So, who needs China? Can we do without that dictatorship? Was agreeing to have China host the Olympic games a huge mistake?
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