[Robert357]

Let me see if I understand what is going on. The Federal Reserve is concerned that the world economy is weak and that a weak world economy especially China, Germany, etc. would mean US companies would have lesser markets. So their solution is to lower the interest rate by 1/4 of one percent.

Another reason the Fed believes the US economy will only grow moderately is because of “trade uncertainties.”

But wait, if China, Germany, France, have weak economies and the USA has a “moderate growth” economy, why would “they” risk a trade war with the USA? China needs to settle the trade deal with the US or it will have serious employment and economic problems that oould result in internal revolution (look at Hong Kong). Europe if they snub their nose at US trade sanctions against Iran, will face serious financial problems for their companies. That in turn will really ruin the EU economy.

So are those countries that the Fed fears will have trade war uncertainty do something that is likely suicidal? I don't think so!

[Magnum44]

One of the things I learned from the presentation I spoke about in post 20 was that only 10% of our economy is trade. Basically as things are today we could let the whole world go to hell and we would still be ok in the US.

Of that 10% our biggest trade partner is Mexico. So even China isn’t all that big a influence. One thought last night was that China deal or no China deal, we win. Right now with no deal, due to tariffs, companies are moving to other Asian countries. If we get a deal, the imbalance gets corrected. The cost of china goods to consumers here in the USA has not gone up as people predicted. So Trump possibly doesn’t care if he closes a deal or not. We are getting the cheap goods from Thailand and Vietnam now. We have no incentive to give in on our demands regarding intellectual property theft or Chinese tariffs on US goods.