"Chimerica" - codependent drug addicts

This piece is a bit long, but a worthy read explaining the current China/USA economic codependency.

...In Washington, China was treated as a threat by some people, but mostly because it lured away manufacturing jobs. Others argued that China's heavy lending to this country was risky because Chinese leaders could decide to withdraw money at a moment's notice, creating a panicky run on the dollar...

...The Treasury is conducting more auctions than ever to finance its $700 billion bailout of the banks. Still more will be needed to pay for the incoming Obama administration's stimulus package. The United States, economists say, will depend on the Chinese to keep buying that debt, perpetuating the American habit...

There's another aspect to this odd couple relationship the article failed to mention though, and it may be the most important long term if true. A flying buddy of mine recently had a discussion with a Chinese industrialist who told him the Chinese are doing what they're doing not just because of the obvious economic codependency, they're doing this because they really believe the USA is the world's engine of technological and scientific innovation.

They expect us to dream up the future generations of scientific breakthroughs and technological crap they plan to manufacture. Not the incremental improvement and evolution stuff, they know how to do that. The Chinese are thinking about the totally off the wall, outside the box, transformational game changers. Star Trek type shit.

I think they're right. Our society, more than any other, tolerates the oddballs and mad scientist types.

posted by Purp at 09:01 AM

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