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Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

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Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#21

Post by davidmathers »

iskander wrote: post #18
narrator wrote: post #6

The funny thing is China isn't an imperialist country. They're primarily concerned with their internal affairs and with the rest of the world insofar as they need their raw materials and advanced technology. They're not very interested in leading and controlling the world like the west seems to be so obssessed with.

First of all, you seem to be ignoring China's wars with India and Vietnam, the Chinese attempt to overthrow the government of Malaysia, territorial claims to Taiwan (and a dozen smaller chunks of land), their continuing support of North Korea, as well as their explicit program of population dilution going on in Tibet and Xinjiang. Anyhow, imperial ambitions grow with capacity. For now, China asserts itself in its "ba…

As an aside on Mugabe, he makes one of those observations that are so precisely to the point that you wonder why so few other commentators ever get round to coming to it. "Darfur, Zimbabwe, Burma, North Korea, anywhere that the concept of human rights doesn't exist, it's always the Chinese at backstop. And always for reasons that you could write down in three words: blood for oil."

-- http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/nov/14/christopher-hitc...

It would be tragic if China were to actually become the dominant power in the world. But that's a long long way from where we are now. And I personally can't see any path from here to there.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#22

Post by Helianthus16 »

narrator wrote: post #6

The funny thing is China isn't an imperialist country. They're primarily concerned with their internal affairs and with the rest of the world insofar as they need their raw materials and advanced technology. They're not very interested in leading and controlling the world like the west seems to be so obssessed with.

This is debatable. They are definitely throwing their weight around and playing some Machiavellian games with world opinion, flat-out denying things that anyone can see is probably true--look at how they re-directed network traffic.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#24

Post by Helianthus16 »

davidmathers wrote: post #5

It's refreshing to see some left-wing economic nonsense on HN instead of the right-wing economic nonsense that usually makes the front page (where's the hyper-inflation you promised me? oh, you meant next year. of course. of course.) Anyway, arguments aside (I'm not convinced he truly understands comparative advantage), isn't the relative decline of America something we want? I can't be the only one who wants to live…

Well... it might not be bonkers, but if you're positing absolute decline then not a lot of what we say is going to matter.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#25

Post by Helianthus16 »

chailatte wrote: post #7
j_baker wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's a given. China is big , but that doesnt necessarily equate to power. Besides that, who says America's decline has to come right now? It's easy to be all doom and gloom in economic times like these, but the grass isn't greener on the other side. Other countries are in this as deep if not deeper than we are.

An aging US population, massive growing debt, shrinking dollar and shrinking manufacturing says America's decline is now.

Yeah, and an increasingly male population, a huge disparity in actual GDP, and the general maturity level of the country rated somewhere around "early teenager" says that China isn't going to take over anytime soon.

China still _acts_ like a 19th or 20th century power. It's still pre-occupied with its "place" on the world stage, so sensitive to insult because it wants so hard to be important.

Sure, that could grow into something, but it ain't there now.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#26

Post by enjo »

chailatte wrote: post #8
csomar wrote: post #4

I'm living in an era where the US dominance is at its highest. May be I'm alone. Let's look around. My computer, my phone, websites and services I use, the cars (we used to buy French ones, now as Ford and other alternatives are available, we and the whole Tunisian population are somehow diversifying).... Everything you can think of, from food to Energy or wars, if you make a deeper look and analysis, you'll notice a…

The American companies (which are mostly multinationals now) are rich (but also have a huge debt load). The typical Americans are poor and suffer from lack of jobs/credit and growing inflation (which is why Republicans were voted into office this month).

Is the typical American truly 'poor'? Unemployment is higher than typical, but hardly at unprecedented levels worldwide. Among the educated class, unemployment (4.6%) isn't even particularly high.

At the same time debt-loads among American companies are not particularly out of whack from previous economic cycles. Hell a lot of companies (Apple, Microsoft, and Google just to name three off of the top of my head) are actually sitting on pretty enormous cash positions. Hell there is concern in the economic community that there isn't enough available credit (and thus, debt) available currently.

As for inflation, I'm not aware of any significant inflation issues here in the U.S. As a matter of fact the inflation rate has been trending downward for the better part of this year.

http://www.inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_rate/curren...

There is some concern that some treasury activity in the form of asset acquisition might stoke some minor inflationary activity, but that's purely speculative at this point.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#27

Post by positr0n »

j_baker wrote: post #13
chailatte wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An aging US population, massive growing debt, shrinking dollar and shrinking manufacturing says America's decline is now.

China's population is aging much faster than ours due to their one child policy. Our debt isn't really a whole lot worse than it was after World War II, and that preceded pretty good growth for us. Lastly, the effect of the value of the dollar going down and manufacturing jobs going elsewhere is of debatable importance.

Yes but after World War II we had thousands of working age men return home to start careers and family. Also the pre-WWII centers of finance, industry, and everything important had been bombed to smithereens, so a lot of that moved to America. None of these affects are applicable today.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#28

Post by m-photonic »

makeramen wrote: post #15
csomar wrote: post #4

I'm living in an era where the US dominance is at its highest. May be I'm alone. Let's look around. My computer, my phone, websites and services I use, the cars (we used to buy French ones, now as Ford and other alternatives are available, we and the whole Tunisian population are somehow diversifying).... Everything you can think of, from food to Energy or wars, if you make a deeper look and analysis, you'll notice a…

>> I really wonder how is this America big decline? They have better education, stronger army, more resources and lot of smart people. Your argument along with your evidence is the state of things as they are today; decline is the trend (the derivative if you may). Just because we're at our peak, doesn't mean we're still growing.

>Just because we're at our peak, doesn't mean we're still growing.

In fact it would mean we're NOT still growing. The "peak," strictly speaking, would be the point where a function ceases increasing and begins to decrease.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#29

Post by mr_luc »

tomjen3 wrote: post #19
gregfjohnson wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people I worry about in the U.S. are the ones who will not be equipped to be entrepreneurs, innovators, or knowledge management types. Only about 30% of Americans earn a college degree. We university types tend to forget they exist, just as most of us forget that the Earth is 70% ocean. They are just off our cognitive rader screens, not part of our universe. I'm wondering if those of us who dream about creating c…

Why should we? Honestly they live better than the bottom 70% has ever done, they have access to fresh fruit and healthy meat even in the middle of winter, they have heated houses, indoor bathrooms with flushing toilets, roofs that doesn't leak and better medical-care than in any other period in history. There may be bigger differences between the classes than there were 40 year ago, but thats a strawman - progress is…

I agree with the truth that this comment expresses, but I hope for different things.

I really mean to blog on this subject, in fact, as it's one that inspires me.

Due to a curious combination of circumstances, I work 3 months each year in a factory (likely representing the bottom 10% of the labor pool), and the system that we have works way worse than it could for all parties involved. I'm very interested in thinking about where it could go with the proper application of technology.

Re: Macro Perspective: Is This America's Great Decline?

#30

Post by j_baker »

positr0n wrote: post #27
j_baker wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China's population is aging much faster than ours due to their one child policy. Our debt isn't really a whole lot worse than it was after World War II, and that preceded pretty good growth for us. Lastly, the effect of the value of the dollar going down and manufacturing jobs going elsewhere is of debatable importance.

Yes but after World War II we had thousands of working age men return home to start careers and family. Also the pre-WWII centers of finance, industry, and everything important had been bombed to smithereens, so a lot of that moved to America. None of these affects are applicable today.

You're right. All of those things are already here. We're even better off than we were then.
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