The Global Economic Playing Field

Why China is winning and why it will continue to win

In the third debate for the democratic nomination for President of the United States, there was one notable point in which democratic candidates actually agreed with the president. Most democratic candidates (9 of the 10) agreed that Trump’s tariff on China will remain, or at least will not immediately be lifted if the government changes in 2020.

https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/08/13/u-s-views-of-china-turn-sharply-negative-amid-trade-tensions/pg_2019-08-13_us-views-china_0-04/

As the data on the left shows, Americans have increasingly come to view China as ‘unfavourable’. Its not just the public, one in five companies, many of whom donate to political campaigns, say that China has stolen their intellectual property within the last year. This has made it politically advantageous for candidates to endorse or rather not renounce the idea of tariffs as a way to counter China’s actions with respect to intellectual property and global surveillance.

So what now? Trump (by extension the republicans) and the Democrats agree on China — specifically that it is a threat to American and global geo-politics. Why then is the title of the article, “The global economic playing field: Why China is winning and why it will continue to win”.

Democracy has increasingly become a popularity contest, where the most ‘likeable’ or in the case of the 2016 election the least non-likeable candidate wins. This brings with it a set of issue but for the purpose of this article, lets focus on one — temporary downturns.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/18/americans-say-the-nations-political-debate-has-grown-more-toxic-and-heated-rhetoric-could-lead-to-violence/

Bad news is seldom accepted in a democracy. To win, a candidate always has to present themselves as having a solution that causes no side effects. Most solutions are presented as a be all end all proposition where no unintended consequences are discussed. Increase there is even a lack of respect by both political candidates and voters to the opposing side. This has increased the incentives for candidates to lie or more importantly omit the truth in order to win. The political pundits and news media have exacerbate this problem…