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China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

nytimes.com

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Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#191

Post by gniv »

lgleason wrote: post #36

As much as some people here may hate Trump, the fact is that he was right when we said that it is difficult for us to lose a trade war with China since we import more from them than we export. Is there going to be some short term pain? Absolutely! But, long term it is likely to create more jobs in the US. As an extra bonus, there won't be as much of a carbon footprint for shipping things half way around the world and…

> we might begin to focus on quality instead of quantity which what we consume if the labor is now a larger part of the price...

I'm hoping the same. I don't think it's likely to happen, but it would be good long term. Short term though, it will be a bit of a shock to see the plastic toy that was $20 now be $100.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#192

Post by jayd16 »

swebs wrote: post #151
gonvaled wrote: post #74

Extremely one sided comments, with a US centric view. The world is not the US, and HN readers are not only US citizens, so let me express a different point of view. Assumption: Trump wants fair trade. HN readers want fair trade. What is needed: fair trading rules, fair IP rules, fair capital structures, and a fair currency. Tackling some of the unfair trade practices does not address all those issues. In particular i…

>Assumption: Trump wants fair trade Where are you getting that from? Trump wants to keep his promise to working class workers that he'll bring their manufacturing jobs back from China.

Looks like you're getting down voted but this whole endeavor seems far more tied to Trump's ego and rhetoric than good policy.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#193

Post by jayd16 »

apo wrote: post #4

Some hard-liners want a more aggressive stance. Lou Jiwei, who retired as finance minister in 2016 but is still the head of the country’s social security fund, suggested on Sunday that China could deliberately disrupt American companies’ supply chains by halting the export of crucial components mostly made in China. But Chinese trade experts dismiss that idea as impractical and not the government’s position. If anyth…

B does not follow from A. Isn't it more realistic that US citizens pay for this trade war with more expensive goods in the short term, while supply chains move to other countries that aren't China but are still cheaper than the US?

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#194

Post by rstuart4133 »

lgleason wrote: post #36

As much as some people here may hate Trump, the fact is that he was right when we said that it is difficult for us to lose a trade war with China since we import more from them than we export. Is there going to be some short term pain? Absolutely! But, long term it is likely to create more jobs in the US. As an extra bonus, there won't be as much of a carbon footprint for shipping things half way around the world and…

> we import more from them than we export.

What that means is a trade war is going to cause prices in the US to rise more than prices in China. Which means either the prices of what the US does export will go up or the USA's standard of living will go down.

In the short term a carefully crafted trade barrier can have positive effects. For example, if the government decides a country should have natural advantage in industry X, but establishing industry X is impossible because of foreign competition than a trade barrier is a reasonable option. In effect the rest of the population is subsidising the initial higher prices and poor quality from industry X until experience and effects of scale kick in.

The danger is a trade barrier can be damned hard to get rid of because inevitably doing so will kill jobs. So hard that killing them it usually requires some sort of crisis. That's what happened in both Australia and NZ a few decades ago, with one Australia treasurer famously saying "if we don't do something we will become a banana republic". The barriers came down, there was an enormous amount of pain (interest rates hitting 20%), and he got voted out. But the country hasn't had a recession since.

If Trump's little war disappears with Trump I doubt it will have much effect on anything. If I was a US citizen, the most worrying line in that article is some democrats support it, so they could stay.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#195

Post by [deleted] »

394549 wrote: post #143
wahern wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every president has declared the ICJ irrelevant. The Pentagon would send tanks to the White House if a President so much as hinted at accepting ICJ jurisdiction. And in any event, the U.S. doesn't dispute the usefulness of the ICJ or its jurisdiction over other countries, it just disputes the usefulness of the U.S. being subject to ICJ jurisdiction. By contrast, the WTO deeply matters to the wealth and security of th…

> Every president has declared the ICJ irrelevant. The Pentagon would send tanks to the White House if a President so much as hinted at accepting ICJ jurisdiction. Are you seriously claiming there would be a military coup in the US over something like that? The US has very strong taboos against military intervention in politics, much stronger than exist in many other countries. That you would make such a claim calls…

[deleted]

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#196

Post by abhi3 »

wahern wrote: post #120
bhouston wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trump could easily destory the wto or declare it irrelevant to the us. Similar to his reaction to the icj.

Every president has declared the ICJ irrelevant. The Pentagon would send tanks to the White House if a President so much as hinted at accepting ICJ jurisdiction. And in any event, the U.S. doesn't dispute the usefulness of the ICJ or its jurisdiction over other countries, it just disputes the usefulness of the U.S. being subject to ICJ jurisdiction. By contrast, the WTO deeply matters to the wealth and security of th…

> Every president has declared the ICJ irrelevant. The Pentagon would send tanks to the White House if a President so much as hinted at accepting ICJ jurisdiction.

Uhm...as far as 'even hinting' goes President Clinton did sign on to The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court without any tanks being rolled out.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#197

Post by jayd16 »

lgleason wrote: post #96
philwelch wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We won’t lose more than China does, but we’re still going to lose a fair amount of wealth and standard of living.

How so? As it is the only people who's standard of living has been rising in the past 30 years has been those at the top while the middle class etc. continue to lose ground.

We could go from stagnant to losing ground.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#198

Post by wahern »

394549 wrote: post #143
wahern wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every president has declared the ICJ irrelevant. The Pentagon would send tanks to the White House if a President so much as hinted at accepting ICJ jurisdiction. And in any event, the U.S. doesn't dispute the usefulness of the ICJ or its jurisdiction over other countries, it just disputes the usefulness of the U.S. being subject to ICJ jurisdiction. By contrast, the WTO deeply matters to the wealth and security of th…

> Every president has declared the ICJ irrelevant. The Pentagon would send tanks to the White House if a President so much as hinted at accepting ICJ jurisdiction. Are you seriously claiming there would be a military coup in the US over something like that? The US has very strong taboos against military intervention in politics, much stronger than exist in many other countries. That you would make such a claim calls…

I made a hyperbolic statement to emphasis that it's not politically viable. No, I don't think there'd be a coup. But I also think acceptance of ICC jurisdiction in the near future is about as likely as there being a coup. The military institutionally--the people that embody the military at the Pentagon, in Congress, in the White House, and elsewhere--would never allow it even if a majority of Americans were okay with it.

ICJ (which I confused with the ICC earlier) is a little different because technically the U.S. has a veto as a member of the security council. Nonetheless, we only submit to ICJ jurisdiction on a case-by-case basis; which is to say, when we know we'll win or when we don't care one way or the other.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#199

Post by browsercoin »

My opinion is not a popular one but I'll reiterate-China will not overtake US at least for the next 100 years.

I think this trade war has been very telling, it showed the underlying fragility of China's boasting as a superpower.

All in all, I see USA recovering from the Trump blunder, and I believe that it will come out stronger than ever.

If anti-fragile by Taleb holds true, the US Gov is relatively anti-fragile to Russian or Chinese ones. Note that anti-fragility refers to the recoverability when exposed to unforseen circumstances. We see the US democratic system evolving and we will see a much stronger democratic process as a result.

On the other hand, things don't look good for Russia's economy along with China now facing an exodus of foreign investors and corporations nervous with China's new dictator.

Re: China Once Looked Tough on Trade. Now Its Options Are Dwindling

#200

Post by jayd16 »

lgleason wrote: post #36

As much as some people here may hate Trump, the fact is that he was right when we said that it is difficult for us to lose a trade war with China since we import more from them than we export. Is there going to be some short term pain? Absolutely! But, long term it is likely to create more jobs in the US. As an extra bonus, there won't be as much of a carbon footprint for shipping things half way around the world and…

There's not much to support this rosy outlook yet. We were already at 'full employment.' Wages are just inline with inflation as they were before and we have farmers feeling the pain of the trade war.

We can certainly hurt China but that was never in question. Whether this scheme will be any good for the US is TBD.

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