Thursday 13 October 2011

Are we cheering for China?

Presenter: Jason Garred
Date: 14/10/11

China is growing. Millions upon millions of people are seeing their economic lives improve. We're wearing some very fashionable clothes and using cool electronic instruments (I just bought a brand new cassette player!) in whose production Chinese people played a major role. So why do so many people in the West appear to worry about the economic threat posed by China rather than unambiguously cheering its economic rise?

Consider, for example, this poll of a sample of Americans (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/01/hus-an-economic-threat/), along with this sample of one American who might end up being quite influential (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jOAAHOlRtlWaVnvFLWsmofMZW-Xw?docId=CNG.c533ceaa1889d9e0230368db0bb1b454.141).

What worries them (and possibly us)?

Are there negative spillovers? http://www.nber.org/papers/w16778
Are jobs at risk? http://www.nber.org/papers/w14061
Are input markets becoming overly tight? http://politics.salon.com/2006/03/02/peak_copper/

Or is it something more subtle than this? Perhaps a worry that a relative decline in Western political power might lead to Western economic decline for political economy reasons? If so, what are these?

In this week's happy hour, why not come and tell us what you think? It's time to decide whether we're shouting 'Hey hey! Ho ho! China's rise has got to go!' or cheering 'Jia you!'http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7uJ_ExULDw

See you there!

Jason

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