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Senator Lindsey Graham Says "This Will Be The Year" China Stops Currency Manipulation, Sees 90 Votes In Support
Here comes protectionism: South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham has told reporters that he has 80 or 90 votes of support in the Senate (guaranteed passage) if his Bill to stop Chinese currency "manipulation" were to ever get to the Senator floor. Graham must be getting some serious voter push to get this passed asap: "I understand why the administration is reluctant to push China, but unfortunately we're running out of time. This will be the year." With the delay in the official US Treasury's stance on the Chinese manipulation stance set to expire soon, Geithner must decide if the fall out from an escalation in trade war at the highest level is worth the offsetting legislation that now seems set to pass should he chicken out once again. The end result, of course, will be the same not matter what: tariffs, duties, subsidies, and generally protectionism. How the collapse of trade helps boost the great export-oriented US boom is beyond our meager analytical skills.
From Reuters:
"We'd get 80 or 90 votes if we could ever get this sucker to the floor," the South Carolina Republican lawmaker told a U.S. Senate Banking Subcommittee on Economic Policy hearing.
"I understand why the administration is reluctant to push China, but unfortunately we're running out of time. This will be the year," he told reporters outside the hearing.
Many U.S. lawmakers complain that China's currency is undervalued by as much as 40 percent, giving its companies an unfair price advantage in international trade.
Analysts expect that China is poised to resume policies that would allow its yuan to trade more widely against the currencies of trading partners. But most say this would lead to only a slight appreciation of the Chinese currency.
"I can't live with small changes in the yuan," Graham said.
"I'm looking for systematic change," he said.
Graham and Democratic Senator Charles Schumer co-authored a bill in 2005 that threatened to slap a 27.5-percent across-the-board tariff on Chinese goods because of its currency policies. However, they later withdrew that plan.
Graham said China was "addicted to exports" and that needed to change to cut persistent trade surpluses, while the United States needed to increase its savings and take other steps to reduce chronic deficits.
"We depend a lot on China, but at the end of the day, the relationship between China and the United States is going to suffer if the American citizenry at large believes -- particularly our manufacturing community -- that our policies are imbalanced," he said.
America has a manufacturing community?
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Everything congress does at this point only hastens the collapse, I actally dont mind these idiotic bills anymore...
Go ahead piss off the country that holds 800b of our debt. This will end well.
screw china. seriously.
My 2nd pair of paper thin made in china shorts ripped inside of a week and I'm sick of buying products that carry the appearance of said product with none of the actual function.
I'd like to see a HUGE chi-com trade war with a side dish of debt repudiation and a heapin helpin' of mega tax sanctions for the amerikan bizzez that offshore.
We're going to have to start making shit in this country again anyway so,
let's git goin.... "see you on the other side y'all"
(MarketWatch) -- China's Commerce Ministry imposed a 96.5% duty on certain types of nylon imports from the U.S., more than doubling a preliminary anti-dumping tariff of 36.2%s set in October, according to a report by the Xinhua news agency.
The ruling, which was to take effect Thursday, caps a year-long investigation into alleged dumping of imports of Nylon 6, or polycaprolactam, the report said. It's a key ingredient used in products ranging from hosiery to tire cords.
The European Union, Russia and Taiwan -- all of which had been assessed anti-dumping penalties in October's ruling of between 4% to 23.9% -- were also named in the ruling, though the finalized penalties were unchanged from levels set in October's preliminary ruling.
The duties will be effective for five years, the report said.The decision comes as Commerce Department officials Washington launch their own investigation into whether certain aluminum products made in China are being unfairly subsidized, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The U.S. and the E.U. are also preparing to hold high-level bilateral trade talks with China in coming weeks.
Wednesday's ruling by the Commerce Ministry kept unchanged a 36.2% tariff against Honeywell Resins & Chemical LLC but reduced to 29.3% the tariff on the U.S. unit of Germany's BASF
"China's Commerce Ministry imposed a 96.5% duty on certain types of nylon imports from the U.S."
Oh no, NOT the nylons!?! The U.S. and our trade surplus with China (and the rest of the world!) is now doomed!?!
Graham is from S. Carolina. Their textile and carpet business is being destroyed by China and other 3rd world nations. Are we just going to rely on our FIRE economy to provide 100% of employment? I agree, this (self-destruction of US) is NOT going to end well.
Their textile and carpet business will not come back until they match 3rd world salaries and benefits. Period. You can't drill blood from stone.
You don't need to match them in terms of salaries or benefits if you can outproduce them via capital investment.
Of course, all the capital is being consumed by the government, so good luck with that, I guess.
An interesting point. I just wonder, if the same firm has to developp two versions of capital investment in two countries, one being the US, the other being another country with a much less human life friendly, which plan is going to yield more profits than the other?
Always baffled when reading this kind of comments.
The whole US is structured in revenues ghettos with environnment for nearly every income bracket but the idea that this model is spreading all around the world with the ultimate consequence that there will be countries for every income (work output) bracket is out of question.
In the US, a clerk must live in a reserved environment but this model cannot mean that through globalization, clerks have to live in certain countries.
Delusional once again.
"Their textile and carpet business will not come back until they match 3rd world salaries and benefits. Period. You can't drill blood from stone."
Of course I know that the Chinese earn about, well, nothing, for their labors. Then our only "hope" is the FIRE work force? Or perhaps something else? I don't see a happy ending here.
I'm in SC and out Textile/Fabric industry has long been gone...
Yeah, I was about to say the same thing--textiles long gone from SC. They build BMWs there now, don't they? So you've got a lot of auto components suppliers replacing textiles. Which do you want auto jobs, or textiles?
See Smoot Hawley Tariff Act and the carnage that ensued.
USA was an industrial powerhouse back then.
It will be very different this time. "Different" as in "Much Worse".
I agree.
60-70% detrimental effect on our exports. Guess we'll have to pick up the slack with all of the extra cash we have lying around.
EVERY time anyone objects or tries to do something about the mercantilist PONZI that China is, we hear AGAIN about S-H and the "carnage" of the GD1.
Back then, WE were the mercantilist exporter!
How can anyone rationally discuss how "trade barriers" are a problem for the US when our trading partners have MASSIVE ONES in continuous existence?
Global trade is a one-way street. And we've let it be that way because the campaign contributions pour in from executives whose bonuses depend upon that.
We should have slapped trade tariffs on China a decade ago for the bullshit they pull, nevermind their yuan peg. Instead we let business interests who were making money off of this mercantilism through globalization dictate our policy.
What, were you sleeping through the carnage of the past 30 years to American industry? What we've already GOTTEN is carnage.
A bit late with reinstating those barriers, once all this industry and jobs have been shipped abroad from the US, there is no turning back. You're right, what has already happened is carnage:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PQrz8F0dBI
+100
amen
Trav, relax. My comment was more in terms of equities and simply an objective observation. I am certainly not defending anything that China does or our current trade policy with them.
The carnage was due to government forced misallocation of capital, taxes, and regulations. It never mattered what China did or didn't do. If China hadn't opened the doors to capitalism, someone else would have, and some other nation would be on all the "Made In" stickers in this country. They didn't steal anything from us, we cut off our arms and legs with a chainsaw in a PCP induced rage. Keynes and his followers supplied the stuff.
Mercantilism DOESN'T WORK, and it never did. Analyze the capital flows to see why. So long as they don't demand redemption of the paper we send them, they are basically giving us free stuff. This is either not sustainable, and China collapses, and we are right back on top, or it is, and we can get free stuff forever (or as long as they keep holding our paper). The paper is in infinite supply. If it wasn't, the purchasing power of our dollars would have skyrocketed due to Asian dollar hoarding.
We've regulated ourselves into a very noncompetetive state. We can start by lessening the regulator complexity of doing business in the U.S. That includes removing union favorotism legislation, wage laws that do nothing but make production costs / sales prices go up on the very people who are supposed to benefit, while killing jobs opps for the least skilled domestic residents. The only way for U.S. people to afford the shit they really want is to buy foreign made.
The dirty lining on the inside of this here overcoat worn by the United States is that well over half the economy is either directly or indirectly parasitic to real wealth production, with many merely degreed welfarists.
Tax Counsel? You're a troll collecting tolls on a wasteful bridge onto which your fellow citiziens are forced by politics.
Lawyers enforcing regulation? JD welfarists!
College Planning financial planner? Jesus Tap-Dancing Christos. This is a NPV of a future obligation, and you're out there with Certified College Planner Ph.D. navigating the arbitrary complexity of this regulation or that (529 plans unique to each state, this IRA rule vs. that, etc.)
Estate Planning Attorney? F'n leach.
Insurance planner selling 2nd to die policies so people's estates don't get crushed? Welfare recipient. Simple.
Expert in IRAs? Thanks for helping me deal with complex BS that is a waste. Gee, if we can get Congress to pass a law forcing everyone to walk through a minefield in their frontyard, we'd find a real boon to map sellers who get to plan said mines. Joke.
and on and on and on. Arbitrary, mandmade complexity that provides 1 billion reasons not to do business in the U.S. Clean it up, let the parasite classes from upper, through middle, to blue collar, to classic welfarists figure out they've got to actually produce things people want, not stuff their required to buy for the benefit of some lobby because the authorities will jail you if you don't, or shoot you if you resist their attempt to incacerate.
Oh, and stop the money printing, crap banking, etc. etc.
Yeah, in other words, we're S.C.R.E.W.E.D.
Agreed.
Welcome to Disneyland.
riiiiight, we're gonna vote in OUR country...to make another country do what we want them to do in THEIR country....
Isn't that how the US works? Without the vote bit though... that is irrelevant and not a pre-requisite
We are a country of fierce warriors, a mighty war-engine!!!
Shall no YUAN survive, killem all!!
Lets the trade war games begin...
Guess what? The global powers decided long ago that financial wars would be far more civilized than arms. We've been slowly weaning ourselves off of the predecessor.
The global game that's being played will reduce us all to ashes, eventually.
I suspect inflation is a massive problem for China that they are having trouble getting under control. (The fact that they even mention inflation suggests it is more than just an annoyance.)
China appreciating its currency would eventually be a win win situation. It would help redirect ill directed export orientated investments to places more appropriate.
But for the communist party nothing is more important than keeping a solid hold on power and anything that could be a systemic threat to that gets hammered fairly hard. So inflation and bubbles will be enemies of the State and will cause them great anxiety.
Disclaimer: Wife is hong kong chinese.
Wife explains a lot. She might be quite uneasy at seeing mainland chinese buying the most valuable asset in Hong Kong: its location.
Cartels running HK have it hard...
Here comes protectionism....
The Imperial March
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bzWSJG93P8
"I'm looking for systematic change," he said.
Couldn't he have said...
I'm hoping for systematic change. I think he would have gotten the White House on board a little easier with that revision....
Again, WHAT?????!?!?
Here "comes" protectionism?
Look, dolts, protectionism has been THE RULE in Japan and China and Europe for DECADES.
Don't act like we're inventing this shit. These have been sheltered and even off-limits markets for decades. It made profit sense to american executives to drive their own bonuses up by offshoring EVERYthing.
Now, the jobs are all gone and the electorate is complaining. The time to have done this was to NOT have passed shit like NAFTA and WTO/GATT.
China steals IP from everywhere WANTONLY. And you call what we're doing protectionism? Let CHINA and JAPAN and EUROPE play fair then come whine. Protectionism has been VERY beneficial for all of them.
Well I think the dropping of tariffs and the globalising of the labour pool has seen the majority of US manufacturing jobs go overseas. They were too quick in getting rid of quotas and tariffs maybe.
Absolutely not. Those jobs were done for with or without protectionism. In the face of rising government interference in their operations and rising taxes, those industries that could, fled to other countries. These countries did have less expensive labor, but much more importantly, they didn't have the regulations that put them at the verge of bankruptcy. If they hadn't been able to leave, they would have simply gone bankrupt, leaving nothing behind.
Protectionism damages the economy as a whole to prop up a specific industry. If you have across the board protectionism, then the math simply DOESN'T WORK, with everyone limited to consumption of locally made products. Your money buys less, and everyone's standard of living goes down. When you allow exports, but disallow imports, it is the equivalent of giving away the products of your nation for free (because the paper you get is worthless). The only party that benefits is the government, who gets extra income from those few foreign goods that are sold.
Well I guess this means that 'Household Sector' (nudge nudge, wink wink) will be buying a lot more treasuries at the next round of auctions.
Yes sirreee, just get that yuan thing up to fair value and our lead painted Christmas toys and poison dog food will be able to compete with anyone! We'll be the envy of the world again.
I wonder what is a larger currency manipulation: fixing one´s currency to other or printing trillions of dollars(i.e. debasing it)?
The largest is: fixing to the one printing!
That's why we are pissed... How can we devalue when the Dragon is holding on to the Eagle's tail?
Understand, they fix their currency by printing more of their own. Basically, they are playing "mirror" with us. We are about to start cutting our face off to spite them. When we start doing that, I wouldn't be surprise if they open up with all guns by spending our dollars on anything in our country that is exportable.
It's like playing chicken with a train. Just plain stupidity.
Is this really protectionism though?
Aren't they really manipulating their currency? Can we compete with a country that pays its people $1 an hour?
"Free Trade" deal with China should never have gone through. Huge transfer of wealth
Am I wrong?
Can we compete with a country that pays its people $1 an hour?
No. That's the point. Are we lowering wages?
It's easy to compete. If the average worker here makes $20/hour, we just have to produce 20x as much as a worker there does. We do this with CAPITAL. Machines, computers, engineering, etc, all make the process run much smoother, and allow an individual worker to do what it once took a hundred, or a thousand workers to do in many cases. Capital is a force multiplier.
Of course, the government has been doing everything in its power to drive every last bit of capital out of the country, which has led us to this sorry "service based" economy. People focus too much on wages, and not enough on capital controls, government regulations, and taxes. China has very little of any of those things, but we have an enormous amount.
Big propaganda.
Labour cost has been an adjustment variable because capital investment not forcefully yield as promised.
In all cases, the capital investment made in the US yields less than the capital investment made in China.
The government has little to do with outsourcing jobs.
One main factor behind has been the US guzzling down resources to better its environment. Yet, once again, while the whole US nation is structured around this notion (no social mixity in the US), translating this model to a global scale seems to be really difficult for some US citizens.
So the Chinese can't buy the same machines, software, etc?
exactly!
We invest the capital to invent new ways of outproducing them and they just copy what we do and violate copyright laws in the process
Let's assume Lindsey is not a foaming at the mouth, raging lunatic. (I know, it's not easy.) What exactly is the case that China has manipulated its currency to our detriment, and who benefits from taking the action he suggests? Are there plans lined up for us to start domestic production of the "virtually everything in Walmart" that China manufactures? What sort of wages will that kind of work pay? Are we trying to raise the price of Chinese junk here, so people simply stay away from Walmart, Lowes, Home Depot etc. altogether?
When Lindsey's not doing an 8-ball and speechifying, he should consider the fact that closing off imports after you've decimated your own ability to produce seems a little shortsighted. But back to the "devaluation"--I'm sure who benefits are various groups that need to have that deval occur for them to make some fat profit. Our detriment has been the fact that we've been spending like a drunken sailor for years and are just now sobering up. Lindsey has to spout some nice populist things 'cos metaphorically speaking, we've woken up in our own vomit to find one of our eyebrows shaved off.
An aside rant: We have a U-6 unemployment of 20% but we don't curtail H-1 visas (another form of cheap import) one bit, because it too benefits the bottom line of big biz.
Re: H1 B Visas...
it's called educational outsourcing. Let some other government fund an educational sytem, then steal their workers.
We know Americans are not interested in those jobs anyhow, right ?
We must have an equal world system of money and wages, the Chinese are our friends. I'm ready to have my pay reduced to the Chinese level, I'm turning Chinese, (who had that tune?)
$38,000 down to $8,000 It will be awesome and I'm ready! Are you?
I think you're thinking of Turning Japanese by The Vapors. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEmJ-VWPDM4
I wish they'd pass a law whereby the states that elect these clowns had to pay their salaries and benefits. I'm sick and tired of my tax dollars supporting such buffoons as Graham and Corker.
Maybe it would cause a resurgence in American Manufacturing? Everyone is saying that China's currency will rise if allowed to float. I'm not so sure about that. It appears to me that currency values are a direct result of the markets view of a specific currency as it relates to soundness, safeness and that Nations ability to stay prosperous. I would think that China's currency would be seen as a much riskier bet than even what the US dollar is.
This is so wrong it's terrifying.
China pegs their currency to the dollar by printing yuan to buy dollars from their private sector. If they stop printing yuan, the value of the yuan will stop falling as the supply stops increasing. In addition, the dollar will fall, as a major source of demand disappears.
What is so disturbing is that so many on ZH have this harebrained idea that the Chinese dollar peg is somehow holding up their currency. This is basic, basic, basic economics. Like, day one stuff. Even toddlers understand this level of economics.
It won't happen for one reason only: it would mean a definitive end of the American Political Monarchy. This is just sabre rattling to get the Chinese to kick their savings rates down a few pegs, realize some improvements to living standards, and appreciate the high-life of American and European goods/services. 'Cuz if the American consumer is tapped out, Treasuries go on blue-light special and the government might actually to have to make a fiscal decision that doesn't involve mandated inflation/COLA + x% every year. Time to get back into the tax racket and start shaking them down at point of sale. We've got roads to re-pave, families to feed, poor to clothe and provide shelter, and sick to heal. This shit don't come cheap, citizen, I don't want to hear about your horseshit bourgeois middle-class woes. Fuck you, pay me.
You hit it right on the head; protectionism = less "trade" with China, which means they don't send their bux right back and Ben has to print and buy our treasuries. Even these dimwitted senators know that; its a dog and pony show.
The very first act of congress was a protective taffiff.
Unless we bring back the "American System," we're doomed to a new dark age in my opinion.
The manufacturing company that make circuit boards I used to work for (100% market share of all circuit boards in Chyrstler cars) went bankrupt and closed in 2006. IT's gone and it's not coming back.
grow a garden, or you won't eat by 2012 in my opinion.
Will. Not. Happen.
Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see manufacturing come back here, but as long as there's an able-bodied, tax-paying, God-fearing American to squeeze, even if it's just him...
...our government will put his feet to the edge of the bathroom sink and wring every last drop of taxable and disposable income like he was made of toothpaste. If not directly or indirectly, then by the creation of a trade deficit whereby our surplus partners purchase nuclear-grade securities in order to keep the currency in their favor. We're a resourceful bunch, goddamnit, and failing the consumer's ability to keep this ship running, our federal gov't will be more than happy to bridge the gap.
I once read a satirical series of posts written by a SomethingAwful user, maybe 3 or 4 years ago (mid-way through Bush's 2nd term), from the perspective of a White House staffer and all the crazy shit that goes on inside. Mostly horseshit type stuff, real creative in that there was just enough "core" info to give you pause. One thing he mentioned was the program whereby the US gov't purchases hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Chinese goods...literally anything they make, drive it out to the middle of the desert, and burry it in a massive underground landfill. At the time I thought, the fuck? Given where the US consumer and US economy is today, you'd have a hard time convincing that the program /doesn't/ exist.
I say we peg the dollar to the Yuan... That will show them!!
Exquisite!
P.S. I think I could get elected to congress with that platform....humm, Dr. No's rise to world domination could be starting again!
Sure thing, Senator. But it certainly WON'T be the year the United States stops currency (and every other form of ) manipulation.
Long-term currency imbalances lead to instability. However, while the artificial peg of the yuan to the $ is a problem, I could point to a number of other items, that if meaningfully addressed, would make the yuan situation more benign.
- tackle unsustainable gov't spending at the federal, state, and local levels - specifically unfunded liabilities. The money isn't there, and won't be there in real dollars. Deal with it - NOW, while we still have a chance at a rough, versus catastrophic landing.
- allow real public education reform and competition - the current system is broken. Throwing more money at it hasn't worked for the last few decades, and likely won't help moving forward. We need better educated citizens if we are going to hold our own or have a decent shot at competing in the world.
- gov't spending and taxation should not be allowed to exceed a certain percentage of overall GDP. Once the public sector is on a sustainabe footing, future gov't growth should be severely constrained.
But Sen. Graham would much rather deal with red herrings implanted with explosives, masquerading as quick fixes, so that he can show his constituents that he is doing something come November - even if that something may very well turn out to be extremely harmful to this nation's well-being. Gotta love all those folks in Congress putting the country first.....
yes - the manipulation will finally end - and the RMB will crash. along with ALL fiat.
has anyone ever witnessed the sands in an hourglass moving up? from bottom to top? i have not.
leave it to the PPT, look they pumped the Dow to 11,000, isn't that like making sand go up in an hourglass
Oh it will be good when the election year is
over and all these foot tapping RINO's can
stop pretending again.
Would it not be easier just to tell China we are no longer going to sell them any of our debt if they do not do what we want?
How could any country's currency be worth much if it is holding 1 trillion dollars of US currency as a investment?
I hope they do brand the chinese manipulators, so the chinese will stop buying treasury debt. This might be the only thing tha can force the govt to stop spending money it doesnt have.
Of course what the senators fail to mention is that, they can stop issuing debt and the problem goes away by itself. Its like a crack addict complaining that the dealer is always present whenever he wants crack.
One way or the other there will be a gradual equalization of standard of living across the world. There is no escaping that no matter which scenario you choose. This wouldnt be a problem if the USD wasnt the reserve currency. Funnily enough the only way for a nation to have its currency as the reserve currency is if it spends more than it makes.
Debt is the fuel of the War Machine. You know the MIC isn't gonna go for that.
The U.S. senate voted 67-33 on June, 30, 2005 to implement a 27.5% tariff on all Chinese goods, a major provision of a bill crafted by Lindsey Graham and Charles Schumer in response to widely accepted allegations of Chinese currency manipulations even though it was determined by the U.S. Treasury in consultation with the IMF as stipulated by OTCA 188 that the Chinese Renminbi was not undervalued as alleged. Subsequently Treasury Secretary John Snow in consultation with Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan assured the Senate of Chinese plans to revise its exchange rates to satisfy demands to re-evlauate the Renminbi by 10% to avoid the "contrary legislation".
For their part, the Chinese responded with an initial 2.1% revaluation which was to be followed by successive revaluations which never materialized. Essentially with the able assistance of Snow and Greenspan, the Chinese managed to outmaneuver the proposed legislative sanctions and in the process avoided the possibility of the resulting higher U.S. interest rates with the inevitable negative effect on U.S. deficit spending via growing Chinese acquisition of U.S. Treasuries. The net effect was the continuing and unhindered growth in the U.S. housing bubble. The latest retread of the Schumer/Graham bill can be expected to provide nothing but a exacerbation of an even much more dire situation which we are experiencing now which could have obviously been alleviated some five years earlier by reigning in rampant U.S. deficit spending and the artificial financial effervescence of the housing bubble. The Chinese resistance to foreign interference and pressure is proverbial. Exchange rate stability is essential to the Chinese domestic economy and overall social stability. This is especially so now as China has posted a budget deficit and experiences the need to increase reserves and slow down its own superheating economy by cutting domestic credit.
The once cozy economic arrangement between the U.S. and China has come to an end. Graham's politically motivated legislation is merely the first salvo of a trade war which itself is perhaps the prelude to more severe ramifications of a geo-political nature, the consequences of which result from the need of self-serving politicians to cover the irresponsible economic policies which they themselves have enacted.
Has everyone thought this out? I'm talking about the, once again, near demand for China to ReValue their currency, and the usual 40% mentioned? That would translate to an Exchange Rate of 4 to $1. Now consider what that means to buying of any Commodity. You might also want to consider all those who have been seeking this ReValuation and their track-record. In early 2005 it took about 823 Yuan to equal $100/US, today its about 682 Yuan to equal $100/US. Who benefits if China does move to a 4 to 1 Exchange Rate, aside from the People who get a further increase in Purchasing Power?
Who has faired better, the country and People with a Stronger currency or a Weaker currency? I think most miss Purchasing Power
The US trade relationship with China is beginning to follow a zen-like circular path.
As a small manufacturer of consumer plastic goods we began as a manufacturer in Los Angeles, then to Mexico, and finally to China. Like most smaller manufacturers, the prime motivater for outsourcing manufacturing was survival.
China is now trying to export its inflation to the largely stagnant/deflationary US economy. There is a deep seated public anger with Chinese trade policies and the US Politicos are scared. Yuan currency revaulation and/or tariffs seem to be a likely outcome.
We are once again renewing our contacts South of the border and beginning the legwork for Mexican manufacturing. Perhaps we will eventually complete the circle and once again produce in the US.
If Congress had been able to enact a sensible Chinese and Mexican trade policy (based on our experience with Japan in the 80's), and the American public had been willing to consume less stuff and maybe pay an extra 15%-20% for the items they really needed; then this circular journey over the last 15 years would have been completely unneccessary.
US employment opportunities and wages would be higher and I could have spent Sundays watching football games, rather than getting a sore butt from a 14 hour plane ride.
You people just don't seem to get it.
China is manipulating their currency to create artificial capital flows that is harming US employment and growth. Bringing them to justice for this trade cheating is not a matter of protectionism, but a matter of fair trade. They don't have third world wages anymore, that's why they are cheating in their currency, to create an advantage that no longer exists. Companies will flock to the cheaper asian countries to have their production needs met once China's newest wealth is reflected in their currency via an appreciation.
The only people against holding the Chinese to their cheating are people who are doing business with China or investing there or whatever.
Graham will settle this one the same way has has settled all the rest. He will vote in tax breaks and subsidies for Chinese auto manufactures to locate in business friendly South Carolina.
looks like graham has a bit of a homo problem. zh might want to do its part on this since most mediawhores are looking the other way.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/20/lindsey-graham-gay-conser_n_544...