Many have been criticising Pres Trump on his "Trade War".
I have just watched a long documentary, 1h20m, on the loss of the US manufacturing industry.

It was made while Obama was still President. I think you will see an
explanation for Trump's election and trade campaign and a few lessons
for us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMlmjXtnIXI

China I suspect is now reaching the stage where it will own all the
technological facilities of the world and the majority of the manufacturing
capability. Along with that they seem to be accumulating most of the
debt holding of the world.
They have at present about US$3Trillion of US debt.
Think they might call that in one way or another ?
They will need a really tough negotiator to get them out of this mess.
What is Australia's debt to China ?

The Democrats and the American Left in general are blaming President Trump for quite a few things that were happening under President Obama. Their hatred has blurred their judgement. The non-Democrat, non-Left can see that Donald Trump is actually repairing the mess left behind by the worst president ever

Bazz,
China can't just call in its debt, but it could sell its bonds or wait for them to mature and not renew them.

But consider what would happen if it does! The debt is all in US dollars, so what would China do with all those US dollars? As soon as it starts to sell them, the US dollar would fall - which reduces the value of the ones they still hold. Meanwhile a weakened currency would see US manufacturing becoming far more competitive.

No negotiations are needed.

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ttbn,
Obama was quite an ineffective President, but Bush, who started most of the trouble, was far worse. And further back in history, there are worse Presidents than Bush.

Trump is walking talking evidence you can fool some of the people all of the time, his pro Russia rant,, not all that long ago would have bought his supporters to boiling point, he is a threat to peace world trade and sanity, if we want a manufacturing industry here do not buy American, cars on top of the list,but buy nothing from them until Trump is gone

Bazz,

Manufacturing goes to where the wages are cheaper: check out where Chinese firms are re-locating to - Vietnam, Kenya, Sri Lanka. The flight overseas of manufacturers is not necessarily a sign of economic weakness, merely that the production of commodities can be done overseas with cheaper labour, while the higher levels of the production process stays in the 'mother' country. Hence lower-level and old-tech production has been winding down for a generation in the US and re-locating. Dinosaurs go extinct. But the dung beetles will still hang around the arse of the last one, waiting and hoping.

One thing Trump can't get his head around (okay, amongst many things) is that the balance of payments includes more than a surplus or deficit in goods traded: the US exports vastly more in services to China than vice versa, something like $ 700 billion p.a. So the balance of payments - the balance of total goods and services - is actually in America's favour. It's a pity that Trump never studied economics, this is usually taught in first year at universities Usually in the first term. So now we will have a completely unnecessary, raging trade war instead.

If I was in the US, I would be unsurprised if the prices at Walmart started rising steeply. Great work, Donny.

Joe

Dear Bazz,

It was Obama who supported their car industry during the GFC when the Republicans wanted them to fail.

There is a difference between imposing tariffs along with lowering taxes compared to government support through tough times to ensure a local manufacturing base. The latter was an anathema to the hard right.

We had no such saviour for ours when our dollar was well over the US dollar and our industry needed backing to get through the mining boom.

A couple of years ago bloomberg reported that German auto workers were being paid 50% more than their US counterparts and yet German auto manufacturers produced nearly 100% more cars than them.

When the downturn happened German companies and workers got together and agreed to temporary wage drops to weather the storm. My understanding it that not one German auto worker lost his job due to the GFC.