The 'China shock' narrative--that a surge of Chinese imports destroyed American manufacturing jobs and the communities that depended on them--became conventional wisdom in Washington and beyond. But economic historian Joseph Francis argues that the claim is much weaker than it looks.
Globalization was always going to fail. The global demographic picture was evolving in the direction where there just weren't going to be enough young people to do the consuming that would make trade possible. And the idea that the United States would continue to hold up the ceiling in a post-Cold War world when there was no agreement as to who the bad guy was, that was always going to fail.
the world is trading city to city now not so much country to country. And we only have one city here. You know, you might call them cities, but the rest of the world is the city unless are a million people.
Trade touches virtually every part of or most of our lives. So, our mission is to fix globalization, but we're not retreating from globalization. We're leaning into it. But we believe that globalization needs to be fixed. It needs to be more trusted, more secure, more fair.
Trade is the lifeblood of growth. This is how we feed ourselves, sustain ourselves, and protect ourselves. So, how do you have both at the same time? How do you have more enforcement and more fracturing as geopolitics play out, but have more trade, more growth, and more economic security?
The more the economies are interlinked, the less likely there is a conflict. So all of this underscores the importance of TSMC Arizona Samsung Intel broadly as well as startup fab projects.
The Chinese are playing a long game in the Middle East, but also a long game around the world. So the China of today is far deeper in the Middle East, including the Gulf, including Iran, including Iraq. When Western companies are not so forthcoming to build things, the Chinese are always there to build things.
7mo ago
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