Bad business in China, no superpower for you!!!

[Mastriani]

After reading this article from MSN, and checking with more reliable sources, it would appear there is a valid point here.

As Western nations become more and more socialist, legislating everything from the environment to human behavior, the “politically correct” smog covers everything.

But, are we too consumerist at this point to care?

Will we wait until thousands are dead from toxic toys and substandard Chinese motor vehicles?

What kind of resentment could this build politically with the ethnocentric Chinese, who have some of the most formidable numbers of soldiers anywhere in the world?

No Superpower for You!!!

Or are we just “hoping” China doesn’t become the next superpower?

I don’t know.

[old6598]

The chinese “miracle” is nothing compared to what the USA did in 40 years from 1930 to 1970 (built an entire country and mass consumerism and wealth , industries beyond any imagination) or what Germany and Japan did from 1950 to 1970 (built the 2nd and 3rd most powerful economy, infrastructures, industry, etc.) in just 20 years.

China, India, South America have been trying for decades and they are going very slowly, they will never reach the point of these 3 mega superpowers. Lets see how long it will take China to go to the moon. granted the US and other western countries may slowly start losing ground, but…

[BlueChicken]

I think the key difference between the USA’s capitalist revolution (post-WW2 expansion) and China’s is the relation to the global superpowers. When the US was expanding it was doing it based on it’s own growth potential, China is working on the outsourced economy of the US. It is becoming strong but I don’t feel gives it the potential to make it the next global superpower as it seems to kind of feed off of it.

[Mastriani]

Very valid point B.C., and I was wondering how they were going to fair when our economic collapse comes, the Euro falls down because of the devaluation of the dollar …

Then what for the Chinese … No Europe, no U.S. to feed their economy?

[old6598]

In fact when the US “was expanding” it generated all that great wealth and power. Same for Germany and Japan. But it seems to me that these country - systems have reached the end of their “expansion”. In the last 30 years, real salaries in the US have decreased, there is alot less “trust” in the future, all basic goods have been becoming more expensive, homes, health care etc. The service economy I think is a farce. The truth is we are slowly entering a world of increasingly limited resources, increasing population, and less possibility to get alot of money by just working.

But these 3 countries became so rich because of their culture, the general honesty of the system compared to its laws, the low level of corruption etc. But these same countries are becoming less “honest”, more corrupt like the US health care insurance parasites who hose everyone, get loads of money and produce nothing at all.

Hospitals and doctors are slaves to the finance barons in the US, in Japan fear of the future is the only name of the game also because houses have always been so hard to buy, Germany still seems to be OK.

But the rest of the world is much worse than these 3 so they will never reach their levels of wealth.

[Mastriani]

Warning from the Comptroller General of the United States:

GAO Wake Up Call in the Financial Times

Learn from the fall of Rome, US warned

By Jeremy Grant in Washington

08/14/07 The US government is on a ‘burning platform’ of unsustainable policies and practices with fiscal deficits, chronic healthcare underfunding, immigration and overseas military commitments threatening a crisis if action is not taken soon, the country’s top government inspector has warned.

David Walker, comptroller general of the US, issued the unusually downbeat assessment of his country’s future in a report that lays out what he called “chilling long-term simulations”.

These include “dramatic” tax rises, slashed government services and the large-scale dumping by foreign governments of holdings of US debt.

Drawing parallels with the end of the Roman empire, Mr Walker warned there were “striking similarities” between America’s current situation and the factors that brought down Rome, including “declining moral values and political civility at home, an over-confident and over-extended military in foreign lands and fiscal irresponsibility by the central government”.

“Sound familiar?” Mr Walker said. “In my view, it’s time to learn from history and take steps to ensure the American Republic is the first to stand the test of time.”

Mr Walker’s views carry weight because he is a non-partisan figure in charge of the Government Accountability Office, often described as the investigative arm of the US Congress.
While most of its studies are commissioned by legislators, about 10 per cent – such as the one containing his latest warnings – are initiated by the comptroller general himself.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Mr Walker said he had mentioned some of the issues before but now wanted to “turn up the volume”. Some of them were too sensitive for others in government to “have their name associated with”.

“I’m trying to sound an alarm and issue a wake-up call,” he said. “As comptroller general I’ve got an ability to look longer-range and take on issues that others may be hesitant, and in many cases may not be in a position, to take on.

“One of the concerns is obviously we are a great country but we face major sustainability challenges that we are not taking seriously enough,” said Mr Walker, who was appointed during the Clinton administration to the post, which carries a 15-year term.

The fiscal imbalance meant the US was “on a path toward an explosion of debt”.

“With the looming retirement of baby boomers, spiralling healthcare costs, plummeting savings rates and increasing reliance on foreign lenders, we face unprecedented fiscal risks,” said Mr Walker, a former senior executive at PwC auditing firm.

Current US policy on education, energy, the environment, immigration and Iraq also was on an “unsustainable path”.

“Our very prosperity is placing greater demands on our physical infrastructure. Billions of dollars will be needed to modernise everything from highways and airports to water and sewage systems. The recent bridge collapse in Minneapolis was a sobering wake-up call.”

Mr Walker said he would offer to brief the would-be presidential candidates next spring.

“They need to make fiscal responsibility and inter-generational equity one of their top priorities. If they do, I think we have a chance to turn this around but if they don’t, I think the risk of a serious crisis rises considerably”.

Our economy at present won’t last another quarter century.

Corruption is the name of game, and old is right, “honesty” is gone from the American system, from top to bottom.

P.S. I don’t need no stinkin’ histories!!! Who wants an American third world cookie? Only $21.50 before the fall of society, get 'em now!!!

[unrealist42]

The developed nations did not reign in pollution and shoddy manufactures until they were far more developed than China is today.
England exported its way to prosperity. Why do you think it had that Empire? Markets markets markets. The US had a big enough domestic market to not need an empire in those days.

China is a lot like the west 100 years ago, growing madly with no concern to mitigate for the damage this causes. As it is, China will have to fix these problems a lot sooner than we did or be faced with vast social dissatisfaction with living in a filthy. polluted and dangerous country.

Unless the communist party gets control of this, they are doomed.