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China sold a record $53.3 billion of US Treasury and agency bonds in the first quarter of 2024, likely due to escalating trade tensions and a desire to diversify its assets. This move is raising concerns as China is a major holder of US debt and its actions could impact the US economy. Additionally, China has been increasing its gold reserves, potentially as a way to mitigate sanctions risk.
The american strategy here makes no sense. Who is all this for? Are american billionaires really OK with losing access to the worlds largest economy just as the population joins the right income bracket to be conusmers of american goods and technology? And are they OK with risking access to much of the rest of the world due to brutal prosecution of unnecessary wars and pissing off China?
The US is ruled by the logic of finance capital because it is ruled by finance capitalists. Buy low, sell high, and let someone else get stuck holding the bag. The actual concerns of production or running a society are irrelevant because long before production breaks down the current owners have dumped their stake for a comfy profit and bought some other industry.
That really puts it in perspective. That’s why their viewpoint and the narratives they push about the “booming economy” are so divorced from reality. They don’t live in the same reality as us.
Agreed. If you look at what’s left of the US industrial capitalist class - Musk, Tim Cook, etc., they’re still very much trying to keep the supply lines open and relationships good. But such is America now that even the industrial capitalists can’t compete against the alliance of the finance capitalists and the MIC.
Musk was publicly begging for tariffs lol
he’s also famously a huge dumbass
I am not an expert here but naively finance seems like it would be the most vulnerable to a shrinking economy. That’s why I’m thinking this makes no sense because if you maintain good relations maybe you can keep the party going for another decade or two before you have to deal with reality.
Maybe it’s more vulnerable but by the time that’s a problem the profit will already be somewhere else and then whoever gets the short end of the stick will get a taxpayer bailout as a consolation prize. They’re not doing economics, they’re gambling with other people’s money.
A shrinking real economy is not as big of a problem for the American ruling class as you might think. Their lifestyles will remain comfortable no matter how much the economy degrades. Their only worry is maintaining power for themselves, and that requires them to make moves that are economically irrational.
if they had become billionaires by their long-ranged foresight and business acumen rather than privilege, sociopathy, and sheer luck, they would probably be concerned but
they are not a single block so there’s probably plenty of rancor and derision of these decisions - but with the Republican state houses repealing labor protections to the point where child labor is allowed, there’s a portion of them that will benefit from the cheapening of American labor.
I don’t get it either to be honest, it’s just so utterly self destructive.
Its a pitiful attempt at protecting it’s incompetent industries, what makes it funny is that actually competitive american industries are gonna lose the Chinese market because of this 😂
To save their weak they’re sacrificing the strong.
It’s just the
policy of “if you can’t beat them, sanction them.” It’s telling that the US can’t get into a full on war with a developed country head to head.
the US Navy basically admitted defeat by Ansarallah when the state dept started offering big concessions to Yemen in exchange for them ending the blockade
can’t even win a minor naval battle against a wartorn nation without a navy
“Sure, we had to call it quits because of Yemen’s drones, but let me have a go at the world’s largest manufacturer of drones. I think I can win.”
China has the ability to produce 8x the number cruise missiles in the entire US armory every week, so obviously we can crush them in a conflict.
USA in WW2: liberty ships aren’t pretty but we’re making three a week.
USA in WW3: this overweight and over-engineered wunderwaffe will overcome the enemy
If hyper inflation decimates the dollar then $100 billion could only purchase $10 billion. It’s a really hard time for their material conditions. (Now imagine the rest of us plebs who they continue to bleed dry).
You got it wrong.
US oligarchs are not losing access to China’s market with these tariffs, they have been gradually losing it when Chinese industries started outperforming them. The purpose of the tariffs is closing the US market for China to protect their pitiful monopolies because they can’t compete with chinese industries.
It’s a desperation move for Biden’s re-election. He is appeasing the US auto industry because he needs UAW support now more than ever thanks to utterly wrecking his chances of winning Michigan. It also endears him to Sinophobes who blame every American ill on China. He must think the effects of the inevitable trade war won’t be felt until after election day because when the price of everything in Walmart doubles it will lose all support.
If this is the case it’s even more out of touch than I thought. The threat from China in the automobile market is their EVs, which poses a big threat to Tesla. Tesla isn’t unionized. If we were to have a company like BYD start selling in the USA, they’d do like all the other manufacturers and open up a subsidiary in the USA and get a plant going here. I think the Chinese manufacturers are smart enough to work with a big union like the UAW but that’s conjecture. That kind of cooperation doesn’t pose a threat to the union workers as it would strengthen them but it does pose an existential threat to our ruling class. The last thing they want is a giant Chinese manufacturer coming here and working with American unions.
I don’t understand how anyone can still NOT understand their strategy
race over welfare. A buncha mayos with 40 mansions gotta own everything on the planet, and if not that’s authoritarian. ez