An old Chinese myth:China's rapid growth is not hugely dependent on exports

Economist ^ | Jan 3rd 2008

[steelboy]

The American government frequently accuses China of relying excessively on exports. But David Carbon, an economist at DBS, a Singaporean bank, suggests that America is starting to look like the pot that called the kettle black. In the year to September, net exports accounted for more than 30% of America's total GDP growth in 2007. Another popular belief looks ripe for reappraisal: it seems that domestic demand is a bigger driver of China's growth than it is of America's.

[Krankor]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojm1Xzwlc9Q

[familyop]

So a recession here caused by the slowdown from December through February will be unlikely to raise the dollar or lower oil prices in late spring or early summer. Maybe we’ll have to do some real work with more domestic manufacturing before long.

[Cringing Negativism Network]

From the Economist website:

> About us
>
> The Economist, Economist.com and CFO Europe are trading names of:
> The Economist Newspaper Limited
> Registered in England and Wales. No.236383

Now that we’ve established the Economist to be British, can we review that little skirmish sometimes referred to as “the Opium Wars”...

What was the reason, for that rather misunderstood dust-up?

China, was running a huge trade surplus with ... Britain.

Now, establishing exactly who was responsible for what policies, to resolve that trade surplus, is a subject for another day. Suffice it to say, Britain found the trade inbalance to be unacceptable. Steps were taken to resolve the inbalance. Conflict ensued.

A bit less lecturing from across the pond, perhaps?

[Cacique]

btt

[Ben Ficklin]

There is a lot of truth to this article.

The example I have used numerous times is the cheap "Chinese" watches available at Walmart and elsewhere. The movement is made in Japan, the case is made in Brazil, the band is made in China, and it is assembled in China.

As more and more of the raw materials, components, intermediates, and finished goods move around the world, the concept of being made/manufactured in a particular nation becomes less applicable. Likewise with the movement of capital and labor

Its a world economy, or, assembly lines are out and supply lines are in.

[Zhang Fei]

You’re right. Vertical integration used to mean the making of a product, soup to nuts, within the same company. After a while, there was vertical integration within the same country - i.e. a product’s parts were made in one country, but by different companies. Later on, a product’s parts came to be made by different companies in different countries. The world has come a long way since the introduction of the first assembly line.