China Indicates It Will Reject U.S. Devaluation Calls

[UpInArms]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A17041-2003Sep2.html

BEIJING, Sept. 2 -- U.S. Treasury Secretary John W. Snow arrived in China's capital today to press the country's leaders to raise the value of its currency, seeking to provide relief to American manufacturers that say they are being wiped out by a flood of cheap goods from the world's most populous country.

Snow's visit came a day after President Bush indirectly raised the issue of China's currency during a Labor Day speech in Ohio in which he lamented the loss of millions of American manufacturing jobs. In what aides characterized as a veiled reference to unfairly priced imports from China, Bush promised to ensure "a fair playing field when it comes to trade."

But on the first of Snow's two day of meetings with China's policymakers, new signs emerged that the Communist government has already decided not to budge on the currency issue, raising the prospect that he will return to Washington with little to show for his journey.

...more...

guess Snowjob couldn't sell the *Co load :shrug:

[sam sarrha]

1. Read the "Art of War" by Sun Tzu... China is at war with us, wake up!

[TheReligiousLeft]

2. Expand.

Please enlighten me. What actions are China taking from Art of War (I've never read the thing).

[sam sarrha]

3. Sun Tzu devised a system of waging war without conflict...450 bc

getting your enemy dependent on you, before Ronnie Raygun, there were around 500 shoe factories in the USA, when he left office, only 3. we cant make our own shoes, tools to make tools, make steel with new efficient technologies, if China cut us off we would be a third world country in a month. and wouldn't have the resources to recover. they are using our greedy corporation's to catch us in a cruel snare. they flood our country with cheap subsidized products and put our manufacturing base out of business then blackmail us or outright destroy us without firing a shot.

[tibbiit]

5. The japanese have done that to

Alaska's fishing industry.

Years ago we watched (reagan years) where for a few years the japanese came in and paid top dollar for fish and got the market used to the big bucks, and dependant. Then one year they cut the price in half. Some of the fishermen boycotted, but of course some stupid scabs sold lots of fish for half price. The next year they (the japanese) came in and cut the price in half again lol... the next year again.
Stupid short sighted idiots.

I agree this is happening, but not just from asia. If the europeans were pretty smart, (and I have no reason to believe there arent just as many greedy, power hungry people in europe as america... their equivelent of greedy, old white men who dont want to lose out Their power or money) they would be doing or preparing some sort of play on america too.

tib

[wickerwoman]

4. And we're not "at war" with China?

Economics is the study of limited resources in a world of (basically) unlimited want. Every country will try (and has a right to try) to secure as much capital and as many resources as possible within international law. There's no need to go to some insidious secret war China is waging against us. They are competing with us just as we are competing with them.
As for the latest Bush ploy, it's an absurd stab in the dark. Without giving China the slightest incentive to devalue their currency beyond "pretty please" this is just another example of Bush's wishful thinking diplomacy.

[el_gato]

8. Economics is a scam

the concepts taught in economics 101 are a cover
for a corrupt system.

An example is the concept of economic effieciency.
This concept does not mean a good produced with the
least amount of energy rather the most "efficient"
transfer of wealth to the correct people. Who are
these correct people? It's those who are successful
at obtaining social power, i.e. those at the top of
the economic pyramid.

It's funny how when worker productivity goes up those who
actually did the work are not the ones that reap
the economic benefits.

The rich get richer, the poor get poorer.
It's not an accident.

[wickerwoman]

9. Actually, I agree with you.

It's not that relevant to the point I was making though.
Economics is generally taught in a moral vacuum with very little consideration for the moral and ethical impact of the "system" they are describing. They simply don't consider variables they don't want to consider.
My point, however, is that China is competing with us for limited resources just as we are competing with them. It is absurd to accuse them of waging some top-secret economic war as if we have some kind of moral high-ground here.

[Old and In the Way]

14. Productivity is a code word for unemployment.

As the average worker's productivity goes up, the actual number of worker's go down. Productivity is a much nicer sounding measurement, don't you think? You can be sure that the American worker's productivity will continue to go up over time.

[Old and In the Way]

6. A big problem is China's battling rising internal expectations.

As hard as it is to believe, there's 100+ people for every job available there. The success of the coastal regions are creating tensions for those in the interior provinces who want to share in the new wealth...to increase the worth of the RNB will exacerbate their employment problems. The government is actively discouraging and controlling access to the industrialized provinces.

Given the vast pool of people ready to take any available job, I think there's little pressure to raise wages in the near term....this is a problem for the entire industrialized world, I think and I am not sure how any government will address this to everyone's satisfaction.

[David__77]

10. Untrue.

There are not "100 people" for every job in China. The country is still largely peasant. The high unemployment, which is perhaps double the US rate, is mainly a function of the historic shift of peasants into the cities to seek other more lucrative work. It's not something that will do China in by any means. It's the most stable economy of the region, with the fastest rate of growth which is the key point.

[Old and In the Way]

12. I admit to getting that information from a friend who owns

a large manufacturing company in DongGuan....perhaps he was oversimplifying the point that he was making...that there is no pressure to directly increase wages in China.

However, here are some stats of interest-

The unemployment rate in South China's Guangdong Province is expected to hit an all-time high this year.......It is common, during this period, for many new laborers to swarm into Guangdong in search for jobs. With more than 10 million people from outside willing to work in the province, local residents face a serious employment concern according to Bu.
http://www.china.org.cn/english/BAT/25453.htm


More than 104 million people around the country had benefited from unemployment insurance by the end of last year.
http://www.china.org.cn/english/MATERIAL/26664.htm


In the next five years, China’s total new labor supply is estimated at 52 million, but the country’s industries can only offer about 40 million jobs, according to the Ministry of Labor and Social Security.
http://www.china.org.cn/english/2001/Sep/18717.htm

So you are probably right, it's not 100:1 , but it still is a huge pool of available workers chasing relatively few jobs.

[Old and In the Way]

7. You know there is a certain irony about this situation that I just

realized.

We've spent almost 50 years fighting "communism" which, at least in China, was based on an agrian economy. Very simple and non-threatening to our way of life. But we had a political dynamic (oddly enough, rightwing and Republican) that demanded we stamp out Godless communism and replace it with Godless capitalism.

It appears we won....and lost.

[David__77]

11. China stands firm.

China is learning lessons from the war against Iraq. I seriously doubt that they will endanger their economic growth, especially when it is doubtful that the US will seek anti-China retribution, when this would hurt US consumers more than Chinese industry.

[Old and In the Way]

13. I think that our war in Iraq may very well have been influenced by the

growing industrial threat that China represents. By controlling the oil in the ME, we have a rather significant carrot/stick that we can use to leverage China's actions on the world stage.

OTOH, today it is in neither our interest nor China's to destroy the trading relationship that is so significant for both parties.