Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 78 Editor's Choice: 28
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Economics...and Best and Worst
[Read the article: Nancy Pelosi and "the butchers of Beijing"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I agree with Andrew, Shannon R. and mostly with Miles Yao. I think Shannon nailed it on the head about what we need to do to show leadership in the future. And I love this line:
"Of course this may change as China becomes stronger. But compared to a self-righteous, resource-chomping, space-militarizing USA that feels entitled to send its aircraft carriers to any part of the world, which one is the bigger threat? I think that poll has already been done."
Pelosi and a the Democratic Party can't change anything. They certainly will not risk a trade war by not renewing MVN status. That's just ridiculous and they have to be aware of that. Unfortunately, as Andrew's article points out, they probably won't constructively face the trade issues either.
I take issue with SB's understanding of economics. She looks at it from a "liberal" (sorry to use that word) perspective. A neo-con would look at it almost the same way...that increasing Chinese consumption is bad, not because its bad for the environment, but because it decreases US consumption somehow. Chinese demand for oil reduces the supply available to US (never mind that much of this oil is to fuel industry which makes products for the US). This view ignores a basic fact from Economics 101: Investment = Consumption. If Chinese save 25% more, that means that they invest 25% more. In China, that investment (not including investment from outside China) goes into the State-run banking system. It goes into bad loans. It goes into crooked real-estate speculation and land confiscation. It goes into investing in bad-performing State-Run industries which mass-manufacture garbage products and sells garbage at cost+0 prices. It goes into massive infrastructure projects which poison the land. Chinese save some 25% (if that is correct) because they have to - they have no social security safety net, a bad medical system, and a really conservative, poor-quality, not-for-free education system (which many rural households cannot afford). On the other hand, increasing household consumption means that they can heat-insulate their homes (note: almost no buildings in China have what Americans would consider basic heat-insulation materials…imagine how much energy would be saved if people would just spend a little bit of cash to insulate their homes!!! I WISH MY LANDLORD WOULD INSULATE MY APPARTMENT!!!). It means buying better education and better medicine. It means spending more money for organically grown food.
I also take issue with Michael B English’s statement:
“China has no such self-awareness. It has no free press. It has no tradition of civil or human rights. At its best, it resembles us at our worst.”
At its worst, China is a place where people know that others have it better than they do and they really want “the good life” for themselves, but they don’t look at what it will really cost them. At its worst, China is a place where a lot of people don’t have much belief in any central ideology, and hence, there is too much room for nationalism to rear its ugly head. And at its worst, China is a nation full of people who are bringing about great change, yet Chinese people almost universally consider it impossible to change the things they hate the most: corruption and the bad education system. On the other hand, at China’s best, they have a government that actually cares and takes action about economic inequality. A government that actually imprisons polluters (sometimes anyway). A government that does not claim to the world that China is better than any other nation in any way.