Changing Politics & Economics of Western Countries vs The Pariah

[Anonymous]

Israel is China's bitch.

China's goal is for every country to be a vassal state.

[Anonymous]

By Jonah Goldberg



Cold War approach won't work with China



It's easy to miss, given how polarized our politics are, but there is a growing consensus around a very big issue: China.



Foreign policy experts, military leaders and politicians across the ideological spectrum all tend to agree that a new era of confrontation with China has begun. Many on the right have been calling for a Cold War approach to China for a while now. But the idea, if not always the term "Cold War," is widely held among Democrats, too.



President-elect Joe Biden, once dismissive about the Chinese threat, now concedes that the country poses a "special challenge" to the U.S.



It's worth dispelling a common misunderstanding. Just because there's a broad consensus around an issue doesn't mean people won't fight about it.



Indeed, some of the greatest political fights are driven by broad agreement on a problem. The best illustration of this point was the Cold War itself.



Contrary to rhetoric from rabid anti-communists from 1945 to 1989, most Democrats were not pro-Soviet.



Some, such as presidents Truman, Kennedy and Johnson, were downright hawkish on the USSR. Some Democrats were "soft" on communism. Henry Wallace, FDR's second vice president, was so soft you could say he was supine. But for the most part, there was broad agreement that the Soviet Union posed a serious threat to the United States and the West.



The arguments among policymakers were over what to do about it, and they were intense. Looking back at the tumult over the Vietnam War, a decidedly Cold War conflict, or the debates over McCarthyism — not to mention U. S. nuclear policy or aid to the Nicaraguan Contras under



Ronald Reagan — you could be forgiven for thinking there was no consensus at all.



Another complicating factor: Conceptually, communism, Marxism and socialism, as well as related arguments about anti-Americanism and anti-imperialism, had significant purchase among many American and Western intellectuals, actors, academics and writers.



Some were pro-Soviet — some were even spies! — but most of them jus t worked from a set of assumptions based on the childish notion that anyone who said America was wrong had to be at least a little right.



This intellectual divide made the political consensus seem more fragile than it was.



That's one reason I'm skeptical of the idea that our confrontation with China will or should resemble the Cold War.



The Soviet Union was a romantic fixation for many American leftists, most intensely in the 1920s and 1930s, but its half-life endured until the fall of the Soviet Union.



In 1919, writer Lincoln Steffens visited the Soviet Union and declared, "I have seen the future; and it works." Almost seven decades later, a fringe socialist mayor from Vermont named Bernie Sanders visited Moscow on his honeymoon and returned to say something similar.



While China held considerable appeals to some intellectuals in the 1990s — The New York Times' Thomas Friedman wrote fawningly about the benefits of Chinese authoritarianism — that's pretty much over now. The Soviets could convert Americans into spies because those Americans were true believers. China has spies in America. ( See the recent controversy over a female operative who reportedly tried to compromise various American politicians, including Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif.) But the currency of Chinese espionage appears to be, well, currency, as in money — with a little sex and blackmail thrown in.



In other words, China is definitely an adversary, but it isn't really an ideological competitor the way the Soviet Union was.



But that doesn't mean confronting China will necessarily be easier, just different.



For starters, the Chinese commitment to Marxism-Leninism is nonexistent save in one regard: the supremacy of the Communist Party.



I shouldn't have to note that a party chock- a- block with millionaires and billionaires isn't actually communist.



Also, China's system of ethnic apartheid and persecution doesn't fit the identity politics prism that sees bigotry as a uniquely white problem.



China's ruling ideology is much better understood as nationalistic, with bits of oligarchy, aristocracy, racism and imperialism thrown in.



It is more comparable to early 20th century would-be hegemons such as Germany and Japan. This creates a whole set of challenges not easily fitted to our 20th century Cold War struggle with an evil empire that did us the favour of embracing economic doctrines that kept it immiserated and crippled technological adaptation and innovation.



The Communist Party's strength is that it can actually claim to have delivered prosperity (albeit at an inhuman cost).



America needs to contain China's ambition to be a superpower, but that will be more difficult if we act like generals fighting the last Cold War.



The Soviet Union was a romantic fixation for many American leftists, most intensely in the 1920s and 1930s, but its half-life endured until the fall of the Soviet Union

[Anonymous]

There's no comparison between China and the Soviet Union. The USSR was about an ideology, that few people outside of elites believed in. China is an ancient civilization that sees itself as the centre of the world.

[Anonymous]

There's no comparison between China and the Soviet Union. The USSR was about an ideology, that few people outside of elites believed in. China is an ancient civilization that sees itself as the centre of the world.

China is a narcissistic country.

[Odinson]

So we need China because the manufacturing costs there are lower.



What happens if we banned all chinese made products from our markets.





Banned all chinese nationals from investing money to the west.

[Anonymous]

So we need China because the manufacturing costs there are lower.



What happens if we banned all chinese made products from our markets.





Banned all chinese nationals from investing money to the west.

As Seoul has posted in the past, labour costs are now about the same in China as they are in North America and Europe..



Western workers produce more per hour worked making labour costs about the same..



China no longer has a wage advantage.

[cc]

So we need China because the manufacturing costs there are lower.



What happens if we banned all chinese made products from our markets.





Banned all chinese nationals from investing money to the west.

We'd have MANY more jobs and higher pay.



Ditching China would be a major win / win in the long haul .. .even in the short range

[Anonymous]

So we need China because the manufacturing costs there are lower.



What happens if we banned all chinese made products from our markets.





Banned all chinese nationals from investing money to the west.

We'd have MANY more jobs and higher pay.



Ditching China would be a major win / win in the long haul .. .even in the short range

Wages are rising quickly in China, but productivity is not, making Western produced goods price competitive..



This of course scares China, and they bully Western countries to maintain the global supply chain in China..



They don't mind manufacturing going to neighbouring countries they control, but supply chains returning to the West makes China paranoid.

[Anonymous]

So we need China because the manufacturing costs there are lower.



What happens if we banned all chinese made products from our markets.





Banned all chinese nationals from investing money to the west.

We'd have MANY more jobs and higher pay.



Ditching China would be a major win / win in the long haul .. .even in the short range

Wages are rising quickly in China, but productivity is not, making Western produced goods price competitive..



This of course scares China, and they bully Western countries to maintain the global supply chain in China..



They don't mind manufacturing going to neighbouring countries they control, but supply chains returning to the West makes China paranoid.

Productivity is a real problem among mainland Chinese workers, except for those at the top. Taiwanese workers are a lot more productive than their mainland compatriots.

[Anonymous]

So we need China because the manufacturing costs there are lower.



What happens if we banned all chinese made products from our markets.





Banned all chinese nationals from investing money to the west.

We'd have MANY more jobs and higher pay.



Ditching China would be a major win / win in the long haul .. .even in the short range

Wages are rising quickly in China, but productivity is not, making Western produced goods price competitive..



This of course scares China, and they bully Western countries to maintain the global supply chain in China..



They don't mind manufacturing going to neighbouring countries they control, but supply chains returning to the West makes China paranoid.

Productivity is a real problem among mainland Chinese workers, except for those at the top. Taiwanese workers are a lot more productive than their mainland compatriots.

Taiwan has been the biggest source of direct investment in China, but I don't know if that's still the case..



Despite low productivity, and high per unit labour costs, foreign direct investment in China is up, while in the West, its way down.

 

[Odinson]

Apparently its not just the wages.



There are other advantages while using chinese labor.

[Anonymous]

Apparently its not just the wages.



There are other advantages while using chinese labor.

Wages are not an advantage at all anymore. When productivity is factored in, Chinese are the same or slightly higher than many Western countries. Westerners are living in the past, if they think that's why Western companies invest in plant and equipment in China.



Beijing can offer incentives that no Western country possibly can. Things like 20 year tax holidays, a speedy rubber stamp regulatory system and access to the most advanced supply chain on earth. However, the biggest pot sweeteners can offer is limiting competition in the Chinese market which means a prosperous captive market of 1.4 billion. No Western country can offer that. Even if Chinese factory wages become the highest in the world, that still makes China a more desirable location to invest than anything in the West.

[Anonymous]

Apparently its not just the wages.



There are other advantages while using chinese labor.

Wages are not an advantage at all anymore. When productivity is factored in, Chinese are the same or slightly higher than many Western countries. Westerners are living in the past, if they think that's why Western companies invest in plant and equipment in China.



Beijing can offer incentives that no Western country possibly can. Things like 20 year tax holidays, a speedy rubber stamp regulatory system and access to the most advanced supply chain on earth. However, the biggest pot sweeteners can offer is limiting competition in the Chinese market which means a prosperous captive market of 1.4 billion. No Western country can offer that. Even if Chinese factory wages become the highest in the world, that still makes China a more desirable location to invest than anything in the West.

I read an article about this. I thought low wages were the incentive that draws foreign companies, but wages are not much of a factor.

[Anonymous]

Apparently its not just the wages.



There are other advantages while using chinese labor.

Wages are not an advantage at all anymore. When productivity is factored in, Chinese are the same or slightly higher than many Western countries. Westerners are living in the past, if they think that's why Western companies invest in plant and equipment in China.



Beijing can offer incentives that no Western country possibly can. Things like 20 year tax holidays, a speedy rubber stamp regulatory system and access to the most advanced supply chain on earth. However, the biggest pot sweeteners can offer is limiting competition in the Chinese market which means a prosperous captive market of 1.4 billion. No Western country can offer that. Even if Chinese factory wages become the highest in the world, that still makes China a more desirable location to invest than anything in the West.

I read an article about this. I thought low wages were the incentive that draws foreign companies, but wages are not much of a factor.

That was the case twenty years ago, but not now.

[Anonymous]

I say it's that Chinese market that draws foreign dollars.