Free trade was to be the solution to all our woes.China and India due their cheap labour forces are now the manufacturing centres of the world;but no one forsaw the pressures on energy,the foundation of all living standards on this planet.

We supply China with the cheapest energy on the planet,yet pay a premium domestically.Our living standards are falling while China's rises and they just bugger the environment.

To me a healthy economy should have a diversity of activity.We have become a service economy based on selling big holes in the ground,while China develops industry and technology.

Does a Globalised economy mean that the rich via the share market surpass national borders and thus the home country can burn?

The real wealth of any economy is in the skills and knowledge of it's people,and not just speculation of selling off anything we can lay our hands on.

China is the world's oldest existing civilisation and perhaps we should learn something from their discipline.

It's funny you say that, because our smartest researchers and technologies are bought off overseas on a constant basis. The Australian government are idiots.

No steel...the Government are not 'idiots'.. they are just as smart as the Scottish Lowlanders and nobles who sold out the highlanders to English lords to expand their sheep grazing territory..

i.e.. FAST MONEY.. and if you make enough of it fast enough, the impact of your decisions about such things as we speak will not have it's impact during your lifetime, or.. if it does, you will be sufficiently economically insulated from it due to their short sightedness.

Power Corrupts, but absolute power corrupts absolutely

I'm not sure I understand all this hand-wringing about China.

We have had our period of relative prosperity, it is bad manners to begrudge another country its time in the sun.

When I was living in Europe, Spain was little more than a cheap tourist destination, good for a fine-weather holiday with cheap paella and sangria. When I was even younger, Made in Germany and Made in Japan were both indicators of cheap - and inferior - manufactured goods. China was a communist state with a billion peasants and oppressive leadership, while Australia was a land of sunshine and opportunity that encouraged migrants from England and Greece via cheap sea passage.

The reason that the relativities change is simple economics, the laws of competitive advantage. If your average wage is $10 a month, and your competition pays $1,000 a month, sooner or later you will learn to exploit this advantage. In doing so, you will initially pay $20 a month, making your business very attractive as a place to work, but still maintaining a significant edge.

Meanwhile, your competitors will start to use the same resources - your people - by injecting capital to build a plant in your country, paying $30 a month. Workers back home will squeal about their jobs being exported, but their shareholders will benefit from the higher profit margins, and the economy at large will benefit from the overall increase in prosperity.

But as we all know, there is no such thing as a free lunch. Sooner or later there will be a dozen companies - now paying $100 a month, by the way - to start competing on a global basis.

Meanwhile, we ask our government to keep selling our minerals to the highest bidder, so that we can buy that plasma TV.

How long before a billion Chinese can afford plasma screens too? Should we care?

Even if we care, there's not much we can do about it except whinge that China shouldn't be allowed to do all the things we have been doing for generations. That's pretty rude, really.

Dear Pericles, international economics of course is a dynamic thing.

You know that. But you also know that history teaches us lessons.

Just because the British treated the Chinese abysmally, and force fed them hundreds of tons of opium so that the crown and its Lords could grow richer.. does not mean we now say "Ok China..its your turn to treat us like that"

Far better to say "Yes.. we sowed some very bad seeds there..and now that the plants are growing and spreading.. we should get rid of them before they consume our primary crop"

If we cannot see that China has the same deep down 'high level' of regard for us as the Brits did for them... we are loony.

Notice how the ethnic chinese are now telling us..no deMANDING in our own streets to 'respect china'?

Oh.. if I can beg Arjay's indulgence for a mo, (sorry arjay.. a little unfinished business with Perilous from another thread)

The difference between what I said to Ruby and what she said, is..
a)I agued my case.
b)I supported it with Islamic history and scripture.
c)I did not 'invent' a scripture which does not exist.
d)I did NOT say "all muslims have been commanded to kill ALL unbelievers.

Had I said that.. I would have absolutely been vilifiying Muslims and inciting hatred against them.

You need to re-read and this time 'understand' what I did say.

I said.."Muslims have been commanded to "fight" ..... this does not mean 'kill all' it means defeat militarily. (but you knew that didn't you.. just wanted to annoy me)
I can support that contention so easily it beggars belief, and that.. is why you confuse CONFIDENCE with 'arrogance' and condescension.

I speak from a theologically trained position, thus I can speak with a degree of authority. That is neither arrogance not condescension.

Boaz, your ability to change the subject when you don't have an argument is legendary, and this was a classic of the genre.

>>Just because the British treated the Chinese abysmally, and force fed them hundreds of tons of opium so that the crown and its Lords could grow richer.. does not mean we now say "Ok China..its your turn to treat us like that"<<

Where on earth did that little diatribe come from?

Economic reality isn't a matter of taking turns at how we treat each other, Boaz. It is how nature abhors a vacuum. It is about water forever finding a level. It is about how imbalances are predominantly temporary, when there is an awareness that imbalance exists and a will to change it.

The opium wars have as much relevance to modern Anglo-Sino relationships as the Battle of New Orleans has on Anglo-US relationships. But more importantly, neither has the slightest relevance to the topic here, which is about free trade, the impact of globalization and the value of labour.

Since you mention it though, I am sure you are aware that one of the harshest impositions on the Chinese of the Treaty of Tientsin was that it allowed the propagation of Christianity in China. This was accurately described by one commentator as "the traditional values of an entire culture undermined by Christian missionaries".

If ever there was an example of how "the British treated the Chinese abysmally", this was it.

Economic warfare is one thing. Messing with their minds is entirely another.