Oh, Shit!

Discussion in 'Business & Economics' started by hypewaders, Oct 16, 2004.

  1. hypewaders Save Changes Registered Senior Member

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    When we think about the US economy, I have this hunch that we will all be saying this soon.

    I think the US Dollar is going to take a plunge. Hip billboards from Lisbon to Osaka: Buy Euros & Yuan: Scare Americans. Get Rich. Call Now.

    The new Burma Shave is coming soon, but this time it's with a flailing machete.
     
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  3. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    The dollar has devalued over the past 30 years to about 53 percent of what it was valued at then. It will weaken more because the exports aren't keeping up with imports and those in charge of BUSINESES are more to blame not totally the government.
     
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  5. Undecided Banned Banned

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    It’s really funny considering that the Asian central banks are trying their best to prop up the US dollar so they can have a monetary competitive comparative advantage over the US. The US is actually lucky that its currency is depreciating because it actually makes imports more expensive, and exports less expensive. A weak dollar is what the US needs to correct its outrageous imbalances which are unsustainable. Look at Argentina once she devalued her currency her economy is growing btwn 10-8% per annum. The bad part is that as the US dollar moves down, so does the Chinese Yuan because it’s pegged. So no matter how low the US dollar gets the Chinese Yuan will not appreciate in tandem so Chinese goods will be forever cheaper unless the Chinese float. That’s a principal reason as to why traditional devaluation for the US might not work so well. But the goods news for the US is that exports are projected to be $814 billion this year a $100 billion in crease, but the trade deficit has still grown to a projected -$581 billion and the current account deficit should be around -$550 billion. Much of the increase in the trade deficit is actually due to oil prices. In essence a American economic collapse is virtually inevitable.
     
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  7. hypewaders Save Changes Registered Senior Member

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    Also, China can cut Uncle Sam loose the moment things get unprofitable. China is approaching the point of creating immense wealth by selling Made in China to a historically unprecedented explosion of a new middle class in China. With a word, tomorrow, China could decree the Yuan and Dollar are going their separate ways, thank you very much esteemed and lawful Americans.
     
  8. dixonmassey Valued Senior Member

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    Not a chance. Until Chinese will not suck up all American technologies they can get (military ones especially), until China has 200 millions jobless, Chinese will work for $ no matter how empty it's. National grandeur follows different path than economics/common sense.
     
  9. Undecided Banned Banned

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  10. dixonmassey Valued Senior Member

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    I spoke with quite a few Chinese. Most of them keep they mouths shut if asked about the internal Chinese affairs. However, few of them told something along the line: "Yes we have plants to build TVs, toys, etc., but Americans can build radars, etc. we cannot build. We need to catch up in military technology and play our own game in the World." Catching up will include working against economic profit/sense. As long as Chinese will see that more and more involved technologies are coming to China, they will work for $. As soon as technology flow will dry up, Chinese will reconsider their "love" to the $. Again, Chinese government does not think only in terms of economics 101. Chinese government think in the terms of old good "geopolitics" first. Being number 1 player on the World stage is Chinese national idea/uniting force. Prosperity comes second.
     
  11. Undecided Banned Banned

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    However, few of them told something along the line: "Yes we have plants to build TVs, toys, etc., but Americans can build radars, etc. we cannot build. We need to catch up in military technology and play our own game in the World." Catching up will include working against economic profit/sense.

    Actually China is surprising even some American military analysts at the rate of technological advancements that the Chinese have achieved with their military hardware. Just look for yourself:

    http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=41227
    http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=40960

    China isn’t a gentle giant anymore. Also China is developing her R&D, and within the next two decades could seriously challenge the US’ now unquestionable lead in science, and development. There is a good article on Chinese science in the special China version of fortune magazine.

    Chinese government does not think only in terms of economics 101. Chinese government think in the terms of old good "geopolitics" first. Being number 1 player on the World stage is Chinese national idea/uniting force. Prosperity comes second.

    The Chinese government understands that its only claim to political power is that of economic power. The Leninist power structure is inherently unstable, and the Chinese have been able to quell another 1989 by seriously impressive economic growth. In order for China to be strong aboard it has to be strong at home first.
     
  12. Undecided Banned Banned

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    China's projected GDP PPP:

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    2010 China should be #1.
     
  13. kmguru Staff Member

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    But the Government can help us export our services since we are now a service based economy. But they do not. I tried with the Commerce department and they are still back in the Industrial Age!
     
  14. hypewaders Save Changes Registered Senior Member

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  15. Roman Banned Banned

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    So what will US do if China overtakes us economically?
     
  16. hypewaders Save Changes Registered Senior Member

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    Most will get poorer. Some of us will discover a new interest in learning a Chinese language.

    ni3 yu4 ban4 jin1 shen2me
     
  17. te jen Registered Senior Member

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    Citizens need to stop thinking in terms of what will this country or that country do in the face of changes to the old order. Countries, or their citiznery, won't "do" anything. The one-percenters who rule nations like the United States don't, I believe, really think in nationalist terms anymore. Not really. A guy like Lee Scott (CEO of Wal-Mart) is completely diversified - he's wired into his worldwide supply and consumption network, plus all the politics that goes with it. Don't think he (and the other members of the Fortune 500 class) isn't also diversified in terms of financial investment - if the U.S. suffered an economic collapse tomorrow, these guys wouldn't shed a tear. They'd just pull up their tent stakes and find greener pastures abroad. They'd abandon the United States like it was a two-dollar whore.

    This is the next stage in the political development of the world. For the longest time we had cycles of feudalism and empire. Then the constitutional monarchies emerged in seventeenth century Europe. Those gave way to different brands of nationalism in the nineteenth century. Some endured, some failed, but all are going to be swept by the transnationalism of the 21st century. Corporations have cut their umbilical cords and are now free-swimming entities, with no loyalty to any nation and no concern for promoting the primacy of any particular class, race, or ideology unless it directly benefits the life of the corporation.

    In the short term, certain nations will be successful at playing the transnational game due to their residual identities - China is very well-positioned in this regard because of their homogeneous national traits. But these advantages will not last long, and the minute they become liabilities the coporations they spawn will leave them behind as well.

    I digress. In any event, the guys who run the show in the U.S. don't have any particular incentive to keep things on an even keel. There are plenty of cash cows in the world, and when the American one starts to dry up, they'll put it on the meat hook and move on.
     
  18. kmguru Staff Member

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    In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries Argentina's economy grew spectacularly as wheat farms and cattle ranches spread out across the flat, amazingly fertile, Pampa grasslands, and rail lines funneled the bounty into the booming port of Buenos Aires. By 1930 Argentina boasted the seventh largest economy in the world and a per capita income higher than Canada or France, and nearly as high as the United States. Among the envious rang the wistful lament, "oh, to be as rich as an Argentine." Joined to Argentina's economic success story was the early flowering of democracy.

    Hard Come, Easy Go...

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