Is The World Deglobalising?(realchinacharts.com)
realchinacharts.com
Is The World Deglobalising?
https://www.realchinacharts.com/p/8-long-view-is-the-world-deglobalising
221 comments
> There is no realistic scenario where the US and China go to war.
How many wars have been preceded by everyone believing they can't happen.
How many wars have been preceded by everyone believing they can't happen.
US vs China would be a war that has never been fought before.
Two nuclear powers trying to kill each other.
I will also be the first time, in a direct war, that the US homeland is directly in danger. If the US invades or bombs mainland China it might be game over, the consequences could be enormous.
Like Joshua said: "The only winning move is not to play".
Since WW2 the US has been at war (oh sorry "military conflict" / "police action") nearly constantly in one form or another.
In all cases they have fought an enemy that was completely inferior.
In Afghanistan, the US used B1 bombers, Drones, Cruise missiles, attack helicopters, an F35, Warthogs and whatever else they used.
Against an enemy that primarily had AK47, some bazookas and various equipment they stole from the allies.
China is inferior to the US in a military sense, but far less so than the other countries they have fought since WW2.
China may be able to take out an aircraft carrier with supersonic missiles (maybe not), may be able to fight the F35 (less so the F22).
The other major problem for the US is that Taiwan is 200km off mainland China. China can bring nearly an unlimited supply chain going.
The US is far away and transporting equipment, soldiers, military hardware etc will be expensive, slow and prone to Chinese submarine attacks.
If China reunites Taiwan by force, it will not take long, and there is is really nothing the world can do, that is sane, except yell, scream, sanctions and so on.
Nobody wants to find out what that war would look like.
I will also be the first time, in a direct war, that the US homeland is directly in danger. If the US invades or bombs mainland China it might be game over, the consequences could be enormous.
Like Joshua said: "The only winning move is not to play".
Since WW2 the US has been at war (oh sorry "military conflict" / "police action") nearly constantly in one form or another.
In all cases they have fought an enemy that was completely inferior.
In Afghanistan, the US used B1 bombers, Drones, Cruise missiles, attack helicopters, an F35, Warthogs and whatever else they used.
Against an enemy that primarily had AK47, some bazookas and various equipment they stole from the allies.
China is inferior to the US in a military sense, but far less so than the other countries they have fought since WW2.
China may be able to take out an aircraft carrier with supersonic missiles (maybe not), may be able to fight the F35 (less so the F22).
The other major problem for the US is that Taiwan is 200km off mainland China. China can bring nearly an unlimited supply chain going.
The US is far away and transporting equipment, soldiers, military hardware etc will be expensive, slow and prone to Chinese submarine attacks.
If China reunites Taiwan by force, it will not take long, and there is is really nothing the world can do, that is sane, except yell, scream, sanctions and so on.
Nobody wants to find out what that war would look like.
Shooting wars between nuclear powers have happened before - 1969 between China and Sov Union and in 1999 between Pakistan and India.
China/US would be the 3rd such example and would likely be similarly limited in scope.
In a China/Taiwan conflict it is likely Taiwan itself that will prevent China from taking over. Wargame scenarios tend to indicate extreme losses on China's side as their invading ships and submarines are sunk and troops on Taiwan's beaches are slaughtered while Chinese coastal cities (where most of the population, wealth and industry are) are pummeled by missiles.
Even if they "win" the outcome will look more like the Soviet invasion of Finland where a Red Army general remarked "we have won just enough land to bury our dead" than a glorious victory.
In such a situation if the US got involved at all it would likely choose to swoop in and mop up after a bruised and battered China retreats, maybe presuming that the CCP has lost moral authority and the leadership could be couped.
The fact that wargamed invasions of Taiwan are so costly for PRC is probably why they resort to saber rattling and economic pressure. It's cheaper.
China/US would be the 3rd such example and would likely be similarly limited in scope.
In a China/Taiwan conflict it is likely Taiwan itself that will prevent China from taking over. Wargame scenarios tend to indicate extreme losses on China's side as their invading ships and submarines are sunk and troops on Taiwan's beaches are slaughtered while Chinese coastal cities (where most of the population, wealth and industry are) are pummeled by missiles.
Even if they "win" the outcome will look more like the Soviet invasion of Finland where a Red Army general remarked "we have won just enough land to bury our dead" than a glorious victory.
In such a situation if the US got involved at all it would likely choose to swoop in and mop up after a bruised and battered China retreats, maybe presuming that the CCP has lost moral authority and the leadership could be couped.
The fact that wargamed invasions of Taiwan are so costly for PRC is probably why they resort to saber rattling and economic pressure. It's cheaper.
This seems a little far fetched. China can bring overwhelming force to bear on Taiwan. Without the US being involved, it would only be a matter of time before the PRC had near total air superiority. And they also have medium range missiles.
Taiwan is serious about military defense and they are well prepared. They have been for a long time. But China simply has far greater numbers and they are very highly motivated.
Taiwan is serious about military defense and they are well prepared. They have been for a long time. But China simply has far greater numbers and they are very highly motivated.
Taiwan is a pain in the arse to invade. Its an island surrounded by deep water.
This means that you need complete air and sea control before invasion. Thats costly and difficult, if you want the island to be intact afterwards.
This means that you need complete air and sea control before invasion. Thats costly and difficult, if you want the island to be intact afterwards.
> Thats costly and difficult, if you want the island to be intact afterwards.
A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would almost certainly entail a prior reconciliation with extreme, prolonged economic disruption from severe global backlash. China desires to control Taiwan as a matter of territorial integrity (from its perspective), diminishment of U.S. strategic influence, and in general national pride. I wouldn't be surprised if the first inbound missiles targeted TSMC and other important industrial assets--less incentive for the U.S. to come to Taiwan's defense. (Not that I think the U.S's decision to intervene would be predicated on mere industrial ties.)
A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would almost certainly entail a prior reconciliation with extreme, prolonged economic disruption from severe global backlash. China desires to control Taiwan as a matter of territorial integrity (from its perspective), diminishment of U.S. strategic influence, and in general national pride. I wouldn't be surprised if the first inbound missiles targeted TSMC and other important industrial assets--less incentive for the U.S. to come to Taiwan's defense. (Not that I think the U.S's decision to intervene would be predicated on mere industrial ties.)
It's not that hard when the island is 200km away and you have 10 000 precision missiles and ten time as many fighters. Total air and navam superiority is something the Chinese are projected to gain in a day or so.
I doubt overwhelming air superiority would be possible, certainly with conventional aircraft. Taiwan has really good anti aircraft systems. Perhaps if China is in posession of some sort of drone tech as yet unheard of. Even then air superiority only gets them so far.
PRC is obviously massively more powerful but Taiwan can still exact a toll way WAY higher than they'd be prepared to tolerate.
PRC is obviously massively more powerful but Taiwan can still exact a toll way WAY higher than they'd be prepared to tolerate.
Taiwan's indigenous anti air system has never been tested. The Patriot systems that the US provided are really bad, in Israel they routinely fail to intercept drones, and in Saudi Arabia they failed to intercept low quality cruise missiles. Those are basic targets with no jamming and no anti-radiation threat. In a real war with China it would get absolutely destroyed. What we do know about indigenous Taiwanese systems is that plenty of buyers were sought but none preferred it to the alternatives.
They will not make it more than two days against the Chinese. Taiwanese has pretty bad air defence systems. There's a reason Turkey wanted to buy S-400 and that's because American air defences suck badly.
They will not make it more than two days against the Chinese. Taiwanese has pretty bad air defence systems. There's a reason Turkey wanted to buy S-400 and that's because American air defences suck badly.
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>The fact that wargamed invasions of Taiwan are so costly for PRC
I don't know what wargames you've been reading but recent western ones finally comport with analysis out of PRC from last few years that a PRC-TW confrontation would be relatively expedient and low cost for PRC, militarily. Current assumption is PRC will secure air dominance within days and enable a lot of relatively uncontested actions in absence of US intervention.
TW barely has enough ordinants to arm their prestige military aquisitions. They certainly don't have enough missiles to damage PRC coastal cities without venturing into warcrime scenarios. It's why currently US is desperately trying to pressure the island into adopting porcupine strategies to bleed PRC in case of invasion. But island isn't biting, the establishment is actively stalling reforms because reinstating civil service and telling population their only hope is to fight like insurgents is politically unworkable.
>invasions of Taiwan are so costly for PRC
The invasion itself isn't and hasn't been for a while. The concern has been dealing with US intervention, i.e. SLOC blockades and potential trade sanctions. Taking TW with relatively little cost is almost forgone at this point. Not to mention PRC has host of other strategies without formal invasion like blockade/quarantine they can do right now without single boot on the ground. There is almost no one except the most deluded actual shills that gets paid by TW (i.e. Ian Easton) who thinks TW can put up much of a fight against PRC anymore.
I don't know what wargames you've been reading but recent western ones finally comport with analysis out of PRC from last few years that a PRC-TW confrontation would be relatively expedient and low cost for PRC, militarily. Current assumption is PRC will secure air dominance within days and enable a lot of relatively uncontested actions in absence of US intervention.
TW barely has enough ordinants to arm their prestige military aquisitions. They certainly don't have enough missiles to damage PRC coastal cities without venturing into warcrime scenarios. It's why currently US is desperately trying to pressure the island into adopting porcupine strategies to bleed PRC in case of invasion. But island isn't biting, the establishment is actively stalling reforms because reinstating civil service and telling population their only hope is to fight like insurgents is politically unworkable.
>invasions of Taiwan are so costly for PRC
The invasion itself isn't and hasn't been for a while. The concern has been dealing with US intervention, i.e. SLOC blockades and potential trade sanctions. Taking TW with relatively little cost is almost forgone at this point. Not to mention PRC has host of other strategies without formal invasion like blockade/quarantine they can do right now without single boot on the ground. There is almost no one except the most deluded actual shills that gets paid by TW (i.e. Ian Easton) who thinks TW can put up much of a fight against PRC anymore.
I read a few that indicated that the US wouldnt do really badly in an "all out" scenario. The US is geared towards fighting colonial wars rather than facing off against equiv-tech adversaries.
They can help a lot (and with relative safety) by firing MCBMs from far away, downing Chinese satellites, supplying arms and materiel beforehand and sending subs to sink chinese invading ships but aircraft carriers, fighter jets and long range bombers would all be useless.
Most wargame scenarios indicate a heavy loss of life on all sides (partly coz the US does insist on using easily sinkable aircraft carriers). China might be able to win if it threw everything it had at the invasion but realistically the government would topple if it deliberately tolerated extreme loss of life (60%+ attrition rate for invading soldiers, perhaps?) - especially if it was doing it invading their Chinese "brothers".
If it were as easy as you said it would already have happened.
They can help a lot (and with relative safety) by firing MCBMs from far away, downing Chinese satellites, supplying arms and materiel beforehand and sending subs to sink chinese invading ships but aircraft carriers, fighter jets and long range bombers would all be useless.
Most wargame scenarios indicate a heavy loss of life on all sides (partly coz the US does insist on using easily sinkable aircraft carriers). China might be able to win if it threw everything it had at the invasion but realistically the government would topple if it deliberately tolerated extreme loss of life (60%+ attrition rate for invading soldiers, perhaps?) - especially if it was doing it invading their Chinese "brothers".
If it were as easy as you said it would already have happened.
If the US is involved that is something else. The issue is that Taiwan might already fall before the US gets seriously in there.
Submarines are complicated. The Taiwan strait is not very deep and any US subs would have to deal with UUVs in large numbers and sonarphones. It would be a difficult target.
Shooting down satellites is a very risky proposition. If the US attempts that, the Chinese will retaliate. The US has a lot more to gain from satellites than the Chinese do.
Once those satellites are shot down though the US has no accurate ballistic missiles. The ATACMS relies on GPS for good accuracy. There is no GPS-independent seeker for ballistic missiles in US service. It's also a slow and easy to intercept missile.
It's not happening because, as a Chinese General put it, why today and not tomorrow? The more time goes on the cheaper and easier and quicker it will be, so there is no reason to rush it.
Submarines are complicated. The Taiwan strait is not very deep and any US subs would have to deal with UUVs in large numbers and sonarphones. It would be a difficult target.
Shooting down satellites is a very risky proposition. If the US attempts that, the Chinese will retaliate. The US has a lot more to gain from satellites than the Chinese do.
Once those satellites are shot down though the US has no accurate ballistic missiles. The ATACMS relies on GPS for good accuracy. There is no GPS-independent seeker for ballistic missiles in US service. It's also a slow and easy to intercept missile.
It's not happening because, as a Chinese General put it, why today and not tomorrow? The more time goes on the cheaper and easier and quicker it will be, so there is no reason to rush it.
Really insightful. Can you recommend any resources that discuss this?
here's a very simple piece to get started. I remember seeing much better sources but can't find any at the moment:
https://thediplomat.com/2021/05/why-a-taiwan-invasion-would-...
https://thediplomat.com/2021/05/why-a-taiwan-invasion-would-...
The other thing is that China is unlike any other peer oponent the US has geared up to fight. They aren't only high-tech, they are also assymetrical. If the US builds another massive carrier strike group, the Chinese will build two hundred antiship hypersonic missiles (whether ballistic or otherwise). If the US builds 100 bombers to deliver a thousand stealthy cruise missiles, the Chinese will use their satellites to detect them taking off and retreat their ships to within range of mainland air defences and integrate the ships air defences to form an air defence system far surpassing anything else outside of Russian (the Chinese use basically the same air defence systems on their ships and on land). Good luck overwhelming the equivalent of 50 air defences brigades all working together. The US spends a hundred billion dollars on super stealthy submarines? No problem, build ten times as many small drone submarines and put high powered sonars at the bottom of the sea beyond the reach of any torpedoes and use active sonar as much as you want without risking any sailor or high value equipment, then keep your ships behind this perimeter. If the US is going to fly advanced stealth fighters, you don't meet them with your own plane for plane, you build super long range missiles and high altitude stealth interceptors to lob them at support aircraft before they can be detected, then bomb the shit out of wherever they took off from before they can re-arm, while blunting the first strike with an air defence system they'll take days to disable.
Because China is only going to fight in its backyard it doesn't have to fight ship for ship and plane for plane like the Soviets or the Germans. It wants to bring the US to fight it in the worst possible place and then beat it assymetrically using every conceivable advantage.
Because China is only going to fight in its backyard it doesn't have to fight ship for ship and plane for plane like the Soviets or the Germans. It wants to bring the US to fight it in the worst possible place and then beat it assymetrically using every conceivable advantage.
There were no wars like WW1 or WW2 fought before them. It's a horrifying thought but not an implausible one on a long timescale. Eventually a society goes batshit (Nazis, Trumpers, etc) and goes all in on the idea.
There will probably be a thermonuclear war in our future timeline, but is it worth, for us the people, to think or prepare for it? When or if it happens, there'll be nothing left.
We can just assume it'll never happen and fight any war outside the physical battlefield (with economical or cyber wars), while trying to spread to other planets.
We can just assume it'll never happen and fight any war outside the physical battlefield (with economical or cyber wars), while trying to spread to other planets.
Preparing for thermonuclear war equates to preventing it from ever happening.
The aftermath is like 536 ("the worst year in human history"), but orders of magnitude worse. Radiactive ash covers the sky. The Sun don't shine for years, possibly decades. Temperatures drop to permanent winter, everthing freezes. Food doesn't grow. Animals die. Civilization collapses.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter_of_536
Only geothermally powered, self-sufficient survival bunkers can support a handful of people, and it's a fight against time. The genetic pool is decimated and our biological evolution is basically halted. Hope you printed out the whole of Wikipedia, and can find the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the arctic somehow.
The aftermath is like 536 ("the worst year in human history"), but orders of magnitude worse. Radiactive ash covers the sky. The Sun don't shine for years, possibly decades. Temperatures drop to permanent winter, everthing freezes. Food doesn't grow. Animals die. Civilization collapses.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter_of_536
Only geothermally powered, self-sufficient survival bunkers can support a handful of people, and it's a fight against time. The genetic pool is decimated and our biological evolution is basically halted. Hope you printed out the whole of Wikipedia, and can find the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the arctic somehow.
Thermonuclear war would certainly kill life in a lot of places and render large areas inhospitable, but I’m not convinced Nuclear Winter wasn’t exaggerated propaganda. Remember the USA/Soviet Union exploded hundreds of nuclear bombs in the atmosphere between the 1940s and 1960s, including some terrifyingly large hydrogen bombs that were much more powerful than what we deliver on ICBMs. Chances are most of the northern hemisphere would have a bad time with fallout for a year or two but large parts of the Southern Hemisphere would continue on as if nothing happened.
These tests were all tweaked for low fallout though, with artificially reduced yields.
And many were air bursts that are less bad because they don't throw a whole lot of soil into the air. A lot of the multi megatonne ones in particular. They weren't simulating actual attack scenarios with those as they were so overpowered there'd be no point. It was just a big dick measuring contest at that point. I think the Soviets won with their Tsar Bomba and I guess the US wasn't willing to escalate it further.
But yeah I think most of the nuclear winter scenarios were based on massive conflict with those multi megatonne bombs which are no longer in use.
And many were air bursts that are less bad because they don't throw a whole lot of soil into the air. A lot of the multi megatonne ones in particular. They weren't simulating actual attack scenarios with those as they were so overpowered there'd be no point. It was just a big dick measuring contest at that point. I think the Soviets won with their Tsar Bomba and I guess the US wasn't willing to escalate it further.
But yeah I think most of the nuclear winter scenarios were based on massive conflict with those multi megatonne bombs which are no longer in use.
The meteor that nearly killed the dinosaurs is estimated to have contained 420 zettajoules of energy in its impact, and to have killed to extinction 75% of all plant and animal species on Earth. There are some 13_000 nuclear weapons currently in the world. If we assume they are all equivalent to the largest one ever tested (210 petajoules), they would in aggregate contain 2.73 zettajoules of energy, or 0.65% of the meteor.
Maybe you're right, we don't have the capacity to blow up the Earth quite yet.
Maybe you're right, we don't have the capacity to blow up the Earth quite yet.
[deleted]
People who think that are thinking about "all in war, people running with guns everywhere".
Even in WW2 that was not the case, there were huge swats of land where people were living as if there was nothing going on.
US is already at war with China on the trade. There is full blown cyberspace and intelligence war going right now.
So that you are not running twice a day to a shelter does not indicate there is no war.
Even in WW2 that was not the case, there were huge swats of land where people were living as if there was nothing going on.
US is already at war with China on the trade. There is full blown cyberspace and intelligence war going right now.
So that you are not running twice a day to a shelter does not indicate there is no war.
Generalizing "war" to mean "competition" robs it of any independent meaning - and once you have done that, you need another word or term to use whenever you need to refer to what "war" actually means.
This competition will mean the same for me as for people in the places where active war was not fought.
I will have problem getting most of the goods, probably will have to pay a lot more for basic utilities.
Life might get overall harder, if this competition escalates, even though there might be not a single bullet fired.
We had "cold war" earlier, now it was "crawling war" in a lot of places.
I will have problem getting most of the goods, probably will have to pay a lot more for basic utilities.
Life might get overall harder, if this competition escalates, even though there might be not a single bullet fired.
We had "cold war" earlier, now it was "crawling war" in a lot of places.
> Even in WW2 that was not the case, there were huge swats of land where people were living as if there was nothing going on.
Isn't that overstating it? I'm aware of swathes without fighting, but wasn't trade pretty disrupted? Wasn't it pretty apparent in port towns if not elsewhere?
Isn't that overstating it? I'm aware of swathes without fighting, but wasn't trade pretty disrupted? Wasn't it pretty apparent in port towns if not elsewhere?
Yeah but isn't there much more inland towns than port towns? Even here in the Czechoslovak Republic many people did not believe there is too much going on until Hitler rolled through the borders despite the state being right next to all the initial warring states, and even then many did not believe there are any atrocities committed for many years...
And then the biggest initial change for many people was that they needed to convert their cars to wood fuel.
And then the biggest initial change for many people was that they needed to convert their cars to wood fuel.
Ports were plenty active - that is precisely what the navies were so occupied with and that induced its own demands for support as well. Viewing it as a lasting trade isolation would be inaccurate - Japan and Germany were allies but they did not share the same battlefields even though both fought against the US and USSR.
Single town level can support at very best a rough age of sale technology level and even then almost certainly no bronze.
Single town level can support at very best a rough age of sale technology level and even then almost certainly no bronze.
Yes I didn't mean that they were inactive - I meant that it was more apparent there than inland perhaps.
That war will only last until China will recover in areas they are behind US, such as in semiconductors. After that China can kill US tech sector by selling at below the cost.
I think that in 10 years we can reach that point.
I think that in 10 years we can reach that point.
At the current pace, it would take China 50 years to catch up in semi-conductors. It won't happen unless they seize Taiwan and its tech with it, or leapfrog the rest with a completely different tech.
Yeah in 50 years we will have developed 0.00001nm technology while China is stuck with 0.001nm tech. These fools never learn.
I think we will be limited by the size of the silicon atom. As far as I remember, 0.00001 nm is actually smaller than a silicon atom which is about 0.2 nm in size.
https://qz.com/852770/theres-a-limit-to-how-small-we-can-mak...
https://qz.com/852770/theres-a-limit-to-how-small-we-can-mak...
Here's an analogy: octane rating is "that level of knock-resistance that matches an N% mix of octane and heptane"; a 90% octane, 10% heptane mixture has an octane rating of 90. So how can racing fuels exceed 100 octane? Well the underlying technology has changed--they use additives that exceed the anti-knock properties of octane--but measure the benefit on the old scale.
The situation with photolithography is similar. At some point there was a N-micrometer process where transistor features actually had an N-micrometer size. Now we have 3nm processes where all the feature sizes are 40nm+, but it's called "3nm" because the new FinFET, GAA, etc. transistors produce the same results as what the old transistor tech would if it could be scaled down to legitimate 3nm sizes.
So I have no doubt we'll eventually have "picometer" processes where all of the physical characteristics are still solidly in the nanometer range but they'll use something like 3d transistors to deliver densities comparable to what a hypothetical "0.01pm" process could deliver using flat FinFETs.
The situation with photolithography is similar. At some point there was a N-micrometer process where transistor features actually had an N-micrometer size. Now we have 3nm processes where all the feature sizes are 40nm+, but it's called "3nm" because the new FinFET, GAA, etc. transistors produce the same results as what the old transistor tech would if it could be scaled down to legitimate 3nm sizes.
So I have no doubt we'll eventually have "picometer" processes where all of the physical characteristics are still solidly in the nanometer range but they'll use something like 3d transistors to deliver densities comparable to what a hypothetical "0.01pm" process could deliver using flat FinFETs.
I can already see it: the US's state-of-the-art reconnaissance tardigrades will get outfitted with Zen 53 EPYCs, while China's fruit fly drones languish behind with their last-gen Xeon knockoff implants.
Where do you get 50 years from?
If we take that number literally than you seem to be implying that China is 50 years behind in semiconductors which would pit their feature size in the micron range or about comparable to what Sam Zeloof is doing in his home lab.
If we take that number literally than you seem to be implying that China is 50 years behind in semiconductors which would pit their feature size in the micron range or about comparable to what Sam Zeloof is doing in his home lab.
They're not fifty years behind, they're a bit over a decade behind. And they're pacing to catch up two years of lag every ten years.
No he means that China won't have the state of the art technology in 50 years. They will be behind a few generations.
Not that many in recent history I think. If my history knowledge is not wrong, major wars have always been preceded by heavy investment in the military. Why would countries invest in their military if they believed that war can't happen?
That's what's going on right now. China is building ships at rates unprecedented since after WWII. It's concerning. My feeling is they have a window of a decade or two during which they can make a grab for Taiwan. After which it may become relatively more difficult with demographics against them, increased defenses in Taiwan, and increased cooperation and perhaps commitment among its allies.
I don't think they will invade Taiwan soon. The economic and political costs will be huge, regardless of military costs.
I think they intend to pressure Taiwan into surrende, by economic and diplomatic means. That will be a very long term goal. But China is good at executing ambitious long term plans and having long term strategies.
I think they intend to pressure Taiwan into surrende, by economic and diplomatic means. That will be a very long term goal. But China is good at executing ambitious long term plans and having long term strategies.
Once they open that door there is no going back. They would need to act at a moment where the US is extremely weak. It might happen if(most likely when) Trump gets elected again. Man I don't even wanna think what happens if that Pandora's box is opened.
As much as I hate trump, as a foreigner I fail to see how the US could look weaker than right now.
Admiration is a different thing from respect.
I might have thought bullies were ridiculous specimens of the human race, and yet, I never dared to cross them.
edit: typo
Admiration is a different thing from respect.
I might have thought bullies were ridiculous specimens of the human race, and yet, I never dared to cross them.
edit: typo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_...
You were saying? :-)
You were saying? :-)
I think he was comparing the US today to the US in the recent past.
Given the humiliating failure in Afghanistan as well as political instability at home, I don't think it's an unfair statement.
Before the start of WW2, the US army was smaller than the army of Portugal, ranked #19 in the world. This was probably part of the reason Hitler foolishly declared war on the US. Of course, what was perhaps somewhat surprising at the time was the US ability to massively and quickly expand that military force under a generally still prosperous wartime economy.
Just saying... :-)
Just saying... :-)
Hitler and Hideki both thought the US population would immediately roll over under pressure. Even then, I still don't understand the logic in adding the US as an adversary, land mass alone would make it near impossible to physically conquer.
Having the largest military is useless if high command is shit.
Bold assumption that the other big militaries have top notch high commands.
I don't fully believe that. First of all we need to differentiate 2024 with the present day. In regards to the present day, despite all the setbacks and the government basically being paralyzed, the US is still moving forward in key technologies and areas of improvement faster than any other western power. Our only real competition is China in many regards and even then they have many pitfalls that could slow them down (instability in the govt, incoming demographic issues).
The worry with someone like Trump getting elected is that he will actively go backwards and thats a problem. Its bad enough that he increases tension within the population. If he actually delivered meaningful progress then I think there would be some argument to have him back. But he actively moves backwards on critical issues that we need to move forward on if we are to compete with China. The worst that typically happens with Democrats is that the country stands still which is not great but thats the low bar we have had for decades now. It is entirely possible that a charismatic outsider can come along and provide some tiny semblance of progress like the Obama years. That is the best case scenario for 2024.
The worry with someone like Trump getting elected is that he will actively go backwards and thats a problem. Its bad enough that he increases tension within the population. If he actually delivered meaningful progress then I think there would be some argument to have him back. But he actively moves backwards on critical issues that we need to move forward on if we are to compete with China. The worst that typically happens with Democrats is that the country stands still which is not great but thats the low bar we have had for decades now. It is entirely possible that a charismatic outsider can come along and provide some tiny semblance of progress like the Obama years. That is the best case scenario for 2024.
>It might happen if(most likely when) Trump gets elected again.
Trump was the first to assert that China represents a danger to US.
Trump was the first to assert that China represents a danger to US.
That statement is a little bit misleading.
Many world leaders, including Trump, started viewing China as a threat to global stability and peace during 2016-2018 or so, in response to domestic power plays and foreign policy and diplomacy changes initiated by Xi.
Many world leaders, including Trump, started viewing China as a threat to global stability and peace during 2016-2018 or so, in response to domestic power plays and foreign policy and diplomacy changes initiated by Xi.
Yes he gets a cookie for reading the tea leaves and telling the country what they wanted to hear. Thats his signature move if you haven't realized. Where he gets a lump of coal is following through. His state department totally botched the attempt to rein in China starting the with ZTE and Huawei debacles. If you are going to fire the shot you better not miss. He has hurt the US so much by not taking that issue seriously and doing things strategically. Those consequences have spilled over into the Biden years and will continue to harm the US long after Trump's first administration have moved on. When Obama was under the same situation with Russia in the early 2010s, one can argue that he put more effort into coming up with a viable strategy to punish them for their actions.
We invested heavily in nuclear weapons with the intention of never using them. Sometimes it really is about deference. Taiwan isn't arming because they want to fight China.
Historically, a lot of people in the early 20th century thought that war wouldn't (or couldn't) happen because it would be too unimaginably destructive. The first world war was called the war to end all wars, and despite later usage originally it was not meant ironically.
Historically, a lot of people in the early 20th century thought that war wouldn't (or couldn't) happen because it would be too unimaginably destructive. The first world war was called the war to end all wars, and despite later usage originally it was not meant ironically.
There is some selection bias as well - if they didn't invest heavily in military then the wars would not qualify as major barring other major imbalances highly unlikely to occur, such as "Conquistador Scenarios".
If both were big and deterred no major war.
If one was overwhelming then they either were the 800 pound gorilla sitting where it wants or the war was short by definition. Even if impactful it is the occupation which would gain focus of history.
If both were limited in military strength they would find there was too much "friction" to do more than shift borders a bit even after handfuls died in skirmishes - they would be unable to hold big gains.
If both were big and deterred no major war.
If one was overwhelming then they either were the 800 pound gorilla sitting where it wants or the war was short by definition. Even if impactful it is the occupation which would gain focus of history.
If both were limited in military strength they would find there was too much "friction" to do more than shift borders a bit even after handfuls died in skirmishes - they would be unable to hold big gains.
US going to war with China (whether it is an economic war, a classic war or a hybrid war ) is US falling into Thucydides Trap. It is one war they aren't going to win. The only winning stance would to not go to war at all.
>US going to war with China (whether it is an economic war, a classic war or a hybrid war ) is US falling into Thucydides Trap. It is one war they aren't going to win. The only winning stance would to not go to war at all.
The problem with national security, is its peacetime leverage is only as effective as your actual willingness to fight a war, even if both sides lose.
Ideally, then both players jointly avoid war.
But in the real world and history, surprising dynamics, contradictory local politics, or miscommunication, can all quickly or slowly lead to wars both countries lose.
The alternative, is consolidation in one country with effectively guaranteed national peace.
Which game do you choose, because in the real world, there is no game where both countries agree to never go to war credibly and solve everything with dice matches, or single handed combat between leaders.
Countries that seem to be reliable allies are almost always on the same side in a leverage battle with another entity. Friends become competitors quickly when there is no shared enemy. And old enemies can also suddenly become fast friends, when circumstances change.
The problem with national security, is its peacetime leverage is only as effective as your actual willingness to fight a war, even if both sides lose.
Ideally, then both players jointly avoid war.
But in the real world and history, surprising dynamics, contradictory local politics, or miscommunication, can all quickly or slowly lead to wars both countries lose.
The alternative, is consolidation in one country with effectively guaranteed national peace.
Which game do you choose, because in the real world, there is no game where both countries agree to never go to war credibly and solve everything with dice matches, or single handed combat between leaders.
Countries that seem to be reliable allies are almost always on the same side in a leverage battle with another entity. Friends become competitors quickly when there is no shared enemy. And old enemies can also suddenly become fast friends, when circumstances change.
It won't be a total war. The only disputed area is Taiwan and the surrounding seas. There is no benefit to China to take anything else.
Thank you Joshua!
> How many wars have been preceded by everyone believing they can't happen.
Since 1945, when nuclear weapons were invented? Zero.
Since 1945, when nuclear weapons were invented? Zero.
Zero wars? Not exactly. We've had no more direct conflicts between superpowers but still a lot of proxy wars, local conflicts, genocides. We still have a long way to go as humanity.
And I think it's only a matter of time before someone crazy enough to use them gets their hands on nukes. Even countries like North Korea have them now. Despite his appearance KYU is not that crazy but maybe this successor is.
And I think it's only a matter of time before someone crazy enough to use them gets their hands on nukes. Even countries like North Korea have them now. Despite his appearance KYU is not that crazy but maybe this successor is.
“by everyone believing they cannot happen” was the qualifier on the statement about war I was replying to, nobody is shocked by proxy wars and local conflicts. It’s how humans have acted as long as we have history and probably before.
Most people believed direct conflict with the USSR by the US cannot happen due to the nuclear weapon risk, and it didn’t. Since the end of WWII, no nuclear powers have been in a war directly with each other.
I agree with you that someone will eventually use nukes in anger, I’m really surprised it hasn’t happened yet, actually.
Most people believed direct conflict with the USSR by the US cannot happen due to the nuclear weapon risk, and it didn’t. Since the end of WWII, no nuclear powers have been in a war directly with each other.
I agree with you that someone will eventually use nukes in anger, I’m really surprised it hasn’t happened yet, actually.
Ah I understand now. Sorry for misunderstanding your post.
> What Globalization should have been is a butter smooth system to trade goods and services.
> Concentrating all manufacturing in China leads to power centralization, as is evident, and forms the basis of creation of another hegemony.
Sorry but 2 is an effect of 1, free trade leads to concentration.
* Iceland has plenty of fish, they do the fishing and buy everything else.
* Ukraine has good farmland, they grow all the crops and buy everything else.
* China has cheap labor, they do all the labor intensive manufacturing and buy everything else.
It is national economics 101.
> Concentrating all manufacturing in China leads to power centralization, as is evident, and forms the basis of creation of another hegemony.
Sorry but 2 is an effect of 1, free trade leads to concentration.
* Iceland has plenty of fish, they do the fishing and buy everything else.
* Ukraine has good farmland, they grow all the crops and buy everything else.
* China has cheap labor, they do all the labor intensive manufacturing and buy everything else.
It is national economics 101.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage
International organizations (like WTO, WIPO [even if we think the copyright is too long, and most of patents are dumb, etc] various UN projects), free trade agreements and such are supposed to keep that "power centralization" in check (eg. with things like ISDS and so on).
But in the end we can't just ignore politics and hope for the best. Yes, maybe, maaaaybe in the graaaaaaaaaaand scheme of things we can. (After all if humanity fuck up so much that we go extinct maybe that's "the best".) But, but, it also doesn't mean that markets and free trade doesn't work. (They work, but they are not miracle tools.)
International organizations (like WTO, WIPO [even if we think the copyright is too long, and most of patents are dumb, etc] various UN projects), free trade agreements and such are supposed to keep that "power centralization" in check (eg. with things like ISDS and so on).
But in the end we can't just ignore politics and hope for the best. Yes, maybe, maaaaybe in the graaaaaaaaaaand scheme of things we can. (After all if humanity fuck up so much that we go extinct maybe that's "the best".) But, but, it also doesn't mean that markets and free trade doesn't work. (They work, but they are not miracle tools.)
> International organizations (like WTO, WIPO [even if we think the copyright is too long, and most of patents are dumb, etc] various UN projects), free trade agreements and such are supposed to keep that "power centralization" in check (eg. with things like ISDS and so on).
Unfortunately, almost all historic international organizations (no matter if the UN, EU, NATO or anything else - hell, even the WHO!) operate on a fundamental requirement of trust and the assumption that there are no obstructionist forces and everyone largely plays by the established rules.
This fundamental assumption has been dismantled, starting in the early 90s with the collapse of the USSR... now we have the US and Israel blocking every investigation into war crimes (I do understand the reason though, given anti-Zionist resentments across the world), China not willing anyone to investigate what happened at Tiananmen Square or in the Uyghur concentration camps or with Covid, the Russians protecting the criminal Assad regime, Turkey fighting with Greece, Hungary and Poland blocking anything that could help refugees or hold their regimes accountable for corruption and a boatload of other bullshit.
Unfortunately, almost all historic international organizations (no matter if the UN, EU, NATO or anything else - hell, even the WHO!) operate on a fundamental requirement of trust and the assumption that there are no obstructionist forces and everyone largely plays by the established rules.
This fundamental assumption has been dismantled, starting in the early 90s with the collapse of the USSR... now we have the US and Israel blocking every investigation into war crimes (I do understand the reason though, given anti-Zionist resentments across the world), China not willing anyone to investigate what happened at Tiananmen Square or in the Uyghur concentration camps or with Covid, the Russians protecting the criminal Assad regime, Turkey fighting with Greece, Hungary and Poland blocking anything that could help refugees or hold their regimes accountable for corruption and a boatload of other bullshit.
Sure, like the general assembly is not voted on by almost all of them by countrys, who then get economic-hegemonic-ally sacked. This is the trouble with almost all international institutions - they are deeply subverted by economic interests.
This goes from the human right council barely condemning genocide, if it is committed by economic ruling partys to WHO recommendations, towing the party line when it comes to them damaging economic interests.
This goes from the human right council barely condemning genocide, if it is committed by economic ruling partys to WHO recommendations, towing the party line when it comes to them damaging economic interests.
That isn't economic interests - it is raw military power. Although the two do correlate at times.
This plays out clearly in the hyper-free trade bloc that is the EU, where different countries end up specialising in particular stages of the production of meat, for example.
What if you live in Ukraine and want to build microprocessors or live in China and likes to be well paid and have worker rights?
Globalisation creates more inequality.
Globalisation creates more inequality.
Recent history has vastly improved the majority of people's lives. Prior to globalization, it's not like China had good workers rights or Ukraine built a lot of microprocessors, so you are setting up a false view of the world without globalization.
I am personally convinced that the only way we can do globalization in a way that makes sense is enforcing labor rights overseas. If our $5 T-shirt can only exist with the exploitation of poor workers in Vietnam then I don't believe we deserve $5 T-shirts. The United States is in a somewhat unique position where we can uplift most of the world if we chose to just stop exploiting their poverty.
Another way to fix it would be to allow the free transit of people. If an iPhone charger has more rights than the person who built it, we are in a very weird place.
How about a few people has most rights and others mostly none of? What if those rights correlate with amount of power and money? /whataboutizm
Realistically that basically calls for taking over the world as step one as it would be required to enforce demands upon others.
The "stop exploiting poverty" sophistic frankly doesn't map to reality. If the US pulled out of trade in Vietnam they would get worse off instead of better. The issue isn't the result of an action to be stopped which turns the entire notion into dross covered up with guilt tripping.
It is the same "leave the cookies on the table to gather dust while trying to eat far richer imaginary cakes" mental pattern as IP zealots who snub overseas direct sales with things like region locks because they think they could get more selling distribution rights months.
The "stop exploiting poverty" sophistic frankly doesn't map to reality. If the US pulled out of trade in Vietnam they would get worse off instead of better. The issue isn't the result of an action to be stopped which turns the entire notion into dross covered up with guilt tripping.
It is the same "leave the cookies on the table to gather dust while trying to eat far richer imaginary cakes" mental pattern as IP zealots who snub overseas direct sales with things like region locks because they think they could get more selling distribution rights months.
Regardless of what you think we deserve or what is right, those sweatshops in Vietnam are lifting the nation out of poverty, just as they lifted us out of poverty in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Sorry to reply to an old thread but I am just finishing "Planet of Slums" and one of my main takeaways is that neoliberal reforms in third-world countries are absolutely not helping (and in fact hurting) the vast majority of people in urban environments. It is our policies that are putting them in this situation and now it's our responsibility to help them out of it.
Of course this is partially a domestic policy thing, but how we view foreign labor now is not working.
Of course this is partially a domestic policy thing, but how we view foreign labor now is not working.
Yes. Tariffs for all countries that have lower labor law and environmental standards.
In the GPs "perfectly round cow in a vacuum" model, the same thing happens all the way down to personal competences / preferences.
Anyway, more problems come from market concentration and market power abuse by single companies than from international competition (except by the point that international market power abuse makes governments powerless).
Anyway, more problems come from market concentration and market power abuse by single companies than from international competition (except by the point that international market power abuse makes governments powerless).
It is an idealized example of what free trade gives you.
Every resource is used optimally.
The argument for it is that the end result is more wealth for "everyone" (on average!)
Every resource is used optimally.
The argument for it is that the end result is more wealth for "everyone" (on average!)
> Every resource is used optimally.
Would you like to be used optimally? As in, extracting the maximum work possible for as little compensation as possible?
There are animal rights groups that won't let you do that to horses.
> The argument for it is that the end result is more wealth for "everyone" (on average!)
Looking at the average and not paying attention to the distribution is a mistake.
Would you like to be used optimally? As in, extracting the maximum work possible for as little compensation as possible?
There are animal rights groups that won't let you do that to horses.
> The argument for it is that the end result is more wealth for "everyone" (on average!)
Looking at the average and not paying attention to the distribution is a mistake.
I am not arguing for either.
Note the quotes around "everyone" and the exclamation mark after average.
Non optimal resource allocation -> less overall wealth.
And free global market is the machine that has optimal resource allocation as optimization goal.
Note the quotes around "everyone" and the exclamation mark after average.
Non optimal resource allocation -> less overall wealth.
And free global market is the machine that has optimal resource allocation as optimization goal.
> Non optimal resource allocation -> less overall wealth.
Unless the wealth is well distributed, it makes no difference for the bulk of the population whose bodies are being optimally allocated.
Unless the wealth is well distributed, it makes no difference for the bulk of the population whose bodies are being optimally allocated.
Your comment is fine. And accurate.
But I am arguing from the standpoint of "global-trade-as-a-machine". And in this case an idealized machine with only one dimension (fish or crops or labor).
Of course if you live in Ukraine and have only one leg and love developing microprocessors, the "global-trade-as-a-machine" will pick that up and let you work on that rather than work as a farmer (one-leggedness and interest/drive as two new dimensions). (Although just as likely it will allow you to move to another country to pursue your interest.)
And of course governments have noticed the inequalities produced by this machine and are doing its best to counter that with more or less enthusiasm.
But I am arguing from the standpoint of "global-trade-as-a-machine". And in this case an idealized machine with only one dimension (fish or crops or labor).
Of course if you live in Ukraine and have only one leg and love developing microprocessors, the "global-trade-as-a-machine" will pick that up and let you work on that rather than work as a farmer (one-leggedness and interest/drive as two new dimensions). (Although just as likely it will allow you to move to another country to pursue your interest.)
And of course governments have noticed the inequalities produced by this machine and are doing its best to counter that with more or less enthusiasm.
> the "global-trade-as-a-machine" will pick that up and let you work on that rather than work as a farmer (one-leggedness and interest/drive as two new dimensions). (Although just as likely it will allow you to move to another country to pursue your interest.)
That's not really how immigration and economic opportunity works. Our one-legged farmer would have to be astonishingly lucky for that to happen.
> And of course governments have noticed the inequalities produced by this machine and are doing its best to counter that with more or less enthusiasm.
It's more like they are taking measures against other governments that gain strategic relevance based on these factors. One way to counter China's advantage with manufacturing cost would be to force China to adopt and enforce better labor laws and increase compensation.
In fact, having a single global standard for compensation and worker rights would be a wonderful thing. As long as it's good and includes progressive taxes on the accumularion of wealth and a mechanism to compensate for undue political power from wealth.
That's not really how immigration and economic opportunity works. Our one-legged farmer would have to be astonishingly lucky for that to happen.
> And of course governments have noticed the inequalities produced by this machine and are doing its best to counter that with more or less enthusiasm.
It's more like they are taking measures against other governments that gain strategic relevance based on these factors. One way to counter China's advantage with manufacturing cost would be to force China to adopt and enforce better labor laws and increase compensation.
In fact, having a single global standard for compensation and worker rights would be a wonderful thing. As long as it's good and includes progressive taxes on the accumularion of wealth and a mechanism to compensate for undue political power from wealth.
More wealth on average means Americans get poorer. Minimum wage, fourty hours a week puts you in the top 4% of wage earners globally.
> Minimum wage, fourty hours a week puts you in the top 4% of wage earners globally.
Now just imagine what the rest of the world has to cope with.
Now just imagine what the rest of the world has to cope with.
Who gets to decide what counts as optimal?
One problem is that globalization comes hand in hand with centralization. All industries have a tendency to cluster around a specific place with the most talent or existing resources.
While this gives disproportional power to some states, this also means no state gets all the cards since none has all the industries. China without its partners is nothing. This is a form of mutually assured destruction, which isn't ideal but better than most alternatives.
While this gives disproportional power to some states, this also means no state gets all the cards since none has all the industries. China without its partners is nothing. This is a form of mutually assured destruction, which isn't ideal but better than most alternatives.
While I agree, what we see practically is different.
Who in the world has genuinely condemned the Uighyur atrocities that China continues to this day?
China is wielding a lot of clout using its supply chain hegemony.
The problem with manufacturing is that you cannot spring up factories and upstream vendors in an instant. Costs lot of money and time.
For many industries, looks like China has captured a good part of the value chain. So, costs of setting up a semi conductor fab is compounded because you have to set up not only the fab, but the whole ecosystem of vendors and suppliers required to run the fab, not to mention the logistics to transport raw materials and the finished goods.
China has industrialized itself at the cost of developed nations (unlike industrialization in other nations, which was built from within). It has fast-tracked its way to manufacturing top spot with blatant IP copying, aggressive value chain development.
Who in the world has genuinely condemned the Uighyur atrocities that China continues to this day?
China is wielding a lot of clout using its supply chain hegemony.
The problem with manufacturing is that you cannot spring up factories and upstream vendors in an instant. Costs lot of money and time.
For many industries, looks like China has captured a good part of the value chain. So, costs of setting up a semi conductor fab is compounded because you have to set up not only the fab, but the whole ecosystem of vendors and suppliers required to run the fab, not to mention the logistics to transport raw materials and the finished goods.
China has industrialized itself at the cost of developed nations (unlike industrialization in other nations, which was built from within). It has fast-tracked its way to manufacturing top spot with blatant IP copying, aggressive value chain development.
>Who in the world has genuinely condemned the Uighyur atrocities that China continues to this day?
Parliaments, heads of state, etc have referred to this as "genocide" despite insufficient evidence (the view of US state department lawyers). I don't know what further condemnation you're looking for there.
Parliaments, heads of state, etc have referred to this as "genocide" despite insufficient evidence (the view of US state department lawyers). I don't know what further condemnation you're looking for there.
There is evidence*, a new trove just emerged recently [1]
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/29/leaked-papers-...
(edit: *genocide is a significant label, whether China's mistreatment qualifies as that is probably to be determined, but evidence of mistreatment exists)
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/29/leaked-papers-...
(edit: *genocide is a significant label, whether China's mistreatment qualifies as that is probably to be determined, but evidence of mistreatment exists)
>genocide is a significant label, whether China's mistreatment qualifies as that is probably to be determined,
That's what both my post and the US state department lawyers said. https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/02/19/china-uighurs-genocide-...
That's what both my post and the US state department lawyers said. https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/02/19/china-uighurs-genocide-...
Right, and I guess we agree that on a condemnation scale of 1-10, being under suspicion of committing genocide, to the degree that nation states open formal investigations is not low?
Yeah I literally can't think of a stronger "condemnation" than that, which is why I was asking.
To your link, evidence, Adrian Zenz, etc, are things I would prefer not to discuss on this site. :)
To your link, evidence, Adrian Zenz, etc, are things I would prefer not to discuss on this site. :)
Actually doing anything of consequence
Like what? Regime change? Genuinely asking.
Trade sanctions are usually a couple of escalation levels below forcing a regime change.
Done in March this year: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-56487162 so it's not simply condemnation, there's action too.
What kind of sanctions do you have in mind?
Although China's share of manufacturing it eye watering, on it's own the US produces more than half as much as China. In fact the story the article is telling is how China is no longer just a manufacturing story as it's economy diversifies and matures.
De-globalisation would be a disaster for developing countries. Being under-developed makes them heavily dependent on developed countries, they can only develop by increasing their engagement and integration with the global economy. Globalisation promotes access to technology and skills, access to markets, access to development capital. Cutting that off globally would be a humanitarian disaster and permanently relegate the developing world to economic backwater status.
Localisation reduces efficiency, that means production requires more labour, more energy and produces less surplus value. It makes local development harder, not easier.
We have seen this play out with recent experiments with protectionism. Tariffs to protect US manufacturing hammered US manufacturing, by cutting off supplies of parts and raw materials. In the longer term retaliatory tariffs would have cut off access to foreign markets for US goods too.
Ultimately, globalisation is about individual liberties. The freedom to travel, to communicate and trade on equitable terms with whoever you choose. Are you really saying that this is a bad thing that must be stopped?
De-globalisation would be a disaster for developing countries. Being under-developed makes them heavily dependent on developed countries, they can only develop by increasing their engagement and integration with the global economy. Globalisation promotes access to technology and skills, access to markets, access to development capital. Cutting that off globally would be a humanitarian disaster and permanently relegate the developing world to economic backwater status.
Localisation reduces efficiency, that means production requires more labour, more energy and produces less surplus value. It makes local development harder, not easier.
We have seen this play out with recent experiments with protectionism. Tariffs to protect US manufacturing hammered US manufacturing, by cutting off supplies of parts and raw materials. In the longer term retaliatory tariffs would have cut off access to foreign markets for US goods too.
Ultimately, globalisation is about individual liberties. The freedom to travel, to communicate and trade on equitable terms with whoever you choose. Are you really saying that this is a bad thing that must be stopped?
De-globalization will likely hurt development of countries. It's hard for a poor country to trade internally when they're poor.
Manufacturing has economies of scale, in a global market there will inevitably be winners who win by being bigger than all other participants. Why wouldn't the global economy settle on a single manufacturing power eventually?
This has been true in the past but need not be true in future.
The US took the manufacturing crown from Britain, France, and Germany (the “made in” label was invented by the British back in the 1880s to try to fend off Germany’s rising manufacturing), Britain having supplanted India and, to Anlässen degree China, through force of arms. Manufacturing was only partially centralized.
The US had lots of land, water transport, raw material, and young labor. This worked for the new steel processes and other mass production. The Europeans were busy with other things.
China had a young workforce, lots of raw material and partially took over some of the legacy industries (e.g, steel), but really picked up new stuff. The USA was busy with other things.
Now China faces a demographic cliff (the workforce is aging) plus major unemployment (of the uneducated) and isnstarting to get busy with other things.
What’s different now is automation, telecom, and automated management. Economies of scale may not apply so much with next gen products from phones to clothes to lawnmowers. If you can get a factory in a box it may be better to sprinkle those around to reduce supply, demand, and transport shocks. These may be more locally configurable.
It seems kind of absurd but I remember when packet switching was wasteful and absurd.
The US took the manufacturing crown from Britain, France, and Germany (the “made in” label was invented by the British back in the 1880s to try to fend off Germany’s rising manufacturing), Britain having supplanted India and, to Anlässen degree China, through force of arms. Manufacturing was only partially centralized.
The US had lots of land, water transport, raw material, and young labor. This worked for the new steel processes and other mass production. The Europeans were busy with other things.
China had a young workforce, lots of raw material and partially took over some of the legacy industries (e.g, steel), but really picked up new stuff. The USA was busy with other things.
Now China faces a demographic cliff (the workforce is aging) plus major unemployment (of the uneducated) and isnstarting to get busy with other things.
What’s different now is automation, telecom, and automated management. Economies of scale may not apply so much with next gen products from phones to clothes to lawnmowers. If you can get a factory in a box it may be better to sprinkle those around to reduce supply, demand, and transport shocks. These may be more locally configurable.
It seems kind of absurd but I remember when packet switching was wasteful and absurd.
You bring a relevant dimension, often overlooked, to the discussion, I.e. the evolution of the manufacturing model and of mechanics of scale economies. Also, to add to that, what we witness with Covid is the disruption of logistics that makes that transition even more relevant. And the social pressure from societies that, whether right or wrong, now associate isolation with better local opportunities and bearable impacts from limited trade. China is understanding the loss it faces in global market trends. That’s why it focuses introspectively on fairness of distribution of wealth. Because fairness will enable a decentralised supply and innovation model targeted on internal consumption of increasingly sophisticated consumers. A tough balance in the context of socialist principles but China has demonstrated impressive ability to weather conceptual stresses on ideological boundaries on the supply end, now they will focus on demand. I am actually optimistic that, for a while at least, benefits will be felt across all economies. It’s the mechanics of the next crisis that will draw the fields of the next conflict.
Because that country gets rich, salaries rise, and another country outcompetes it as a cheap source of labor. This happened to GB, Germany, USA, Japan, South Korea, and will happen to China.
It will take a long time until some other countries will overtake China. And China isn't going to sit doing nothing. They buy and invest all over the world. They invest in foreign resources, infrastructure and manufacturing.
That's what every former industrial power did. I'm not saying China will fall into ruin, it will simply be just another developed country outsourcing industry to cheaper countries.
They are only one doubling of gdp per capita away from surpassing Poland. Give it 20 years.
I think you'll find that china has succeeded due to more factors than cheap labor. If it was only cheap labor we'd expect other low cost countries with large populations to have performed similarly.
China had at least the following combination of factors in its favor.
- Geopolitical alignment with the current superpower resulting in favorable trade deals across the globe with no need to expend military and diplomatic power to maintain trade.
- A government which actively supported infrastructure investment with a corruption level low enough to actually build infrastructure with the investment.
- A trade policy which encouraged foreign direct investment but required companies to train locals and ultimately leave IP/management decisions locally.
- A strong investment in STEM education, including importing of talent from abroad.
- A stable governing structure.
- A young, low-cost, urbanizing labor force.
There are likely many more factors in China's economic performance. But it would be foolish to believe that China succeeded because of cheap labor, or that manufacturers are going to move shop out of China as soon as labor costs rise. At this point I'd be skeptical that most US manufacturers who outsourced to China could relocate their manufacturing without the technical expertise of the same Chinese manufacturers they outsourced too.
China had at least the following combination of factors in its favor.
- Geopolitical alignment with the current superpower resulting in favorable trade deals across the globe with no need to expend military and diplomatic power to maintain trade.
- A government which actively supported infrastructure investment with a corruption level low enough to actually build infrastructure with the investment.
- A trade policy which encouraged foreign direct investment but required companies to train locals and ultimately leave IP/management decisions locally.
- A strong investment in STEM education, including importing of talent from abroad.
- A stable governing structure.
- A young, low-cost, urbanizing labor force.
There are likely many more factors in China's economic performance. But it would be foolish to believe that China succeeded because of cheap labor, or that manufacturers are going to move shop out of China as soon as labor costs rise. At this point I'd be skeptical that most US manufacturers who outsourced to China could relocate their manufacturing without the technical expertise of the same Chinese manufacturers they outsourced too.
"More dynamic relationships between countries" sounds a lot like a situation of increased hostility and instability. Like pre World Wars Europe. A bit ironic given the first World War is the counterexample for interdependency preventing wars while also making it abundantly clear that they really should have listened.
Why wouldn't the US and China go to war over Taiwan? Both countries plan for that possibility. China perceives the US as weak, divided and unwilling to sacrifice for foreign wars. It has said it wants to resolve the Taiwan issue.
US can't afford to not go to war if China invades Taiwan. Otherwise they will lose access to much of the semiconductors supply and also they will become irrelevant for international affairs. Nobody will care about US anymore.
But China also can't afford to invade Taiwan. That will be a major economic and political disaster. It would bring China back 20 years. Regardless of actually winning the war or not.
But China also can't afford to invade Taiwan. That will be a major economic and political disaster. It would bring China back 20 years. Regardless of actually winning the war or not.
How would the US lose access without all other countries also losing access putting everyone on equal footing? I highly doubt the foundries would survive an invasion.
The foundries aren't nearly the lifeline people think it is. If China uses sneak attacks to destroy all the foundries, then what? Do you suppose US won't intervene? If US will still intervene then it was never the critical piece to begin with.
> De-globalizing certainly helps in all round development of all countries
How? Globalization allows companies to exploit comparative advantages, such as cheap labor. The increased demand for labor, over time, leads to higher wages, which leads to a number of social and - obviously - economic benefits.
It's certainly not the end all, be all, but better living conditions through economic activity is the primary driver the large decline in extreme poverty that's occurred over the last half-century. Globalization didn't play a role in all of this - export-led economic policies, along with targeted investments in prestigious industries by many countries, also helped. However, this decline in poverty, at this magnitude - absolutely - would not have happened without globalization.
Case in point. In 1990, there were almost one billion people living in extreme poverty in East Asia, South-East Asia, and the Pacific. In 2017, that number fell to 27 million. Source: World Bank, https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2020/10/07/global-....
> Concentrating all manufacturing in China leads to power centralization
Employment in the Chinese secondary sector is almost static over the last ten years. GDP from the secondary sector as a percentage of GDP is down significantly. While the size of the secondary sector in absolute numbers, iirc, has gone up, this is due to Chinese manufacturings moving towards higher priced exports.
China will likely continue to be world's largest manufacturer for a long time. However, there is nothing that suggests that global manufacturing continues to centralize there, and there are a - very, very, large - number of signs suggesting that companies are off-shoring away from China to lower cost countries.
> as is evident, and forms the basis of creation of another hegemony.
To quote Game of Thrones, "Power is Power". Russia has an economy that is smaller than Italy's by several hundred billion dollars. Russia also has a blue water navy and nuclear weapons.
> The effectiveness of military power goes only so far.
Agreed.
> There is no realistic scenario where the US and China go to war.
We can agree to disagree here. There is no reasonable scenario, but there are a number of realistic ones.
> So China has great leverage and will continually nibble its way to global dominance.
Let's assume that China's economic and demographic issues are beginning to catch up to them, which is very common for middle income export-led countries with poor demographics. They share borders with two nuclear armed countries and several other highly developed countries. Their largest trading partner is their largest "adversary". Their lines of communication run through other countries, and they are dependent on other countries for their energy needs. China also happens to be a highly heterogeneous country, which has been concealed by a thin-veneer of nationalism.
In short, China much more closely resembles 19th century Germany than it does 20th century Russia or the United States.
How? Globalization allows companies to exploit comparative advantages, such as cheap labor. The increased demand for labor, over time, leads to higher wages, which leads to a number of social and - obviously - economic benefits.
It's certainly not the end all, be all, but better living conditions through economic activity is the primary driver the large decline in extreme poverty that's occurred over the last half-century. Globalization didn't play a role in all of this - export-led economic policies, along with targeted investments in prestigious industries by many countries, also helped. However, this decline in poverty, at this magnitude - absolutely - would not have happened without globalization.
Case in point. In 1990, there were almost one billion people living in extreme poverty in East Asia, South-East Asia, and the Pacific. In 2017, that number fell to 27 million. Source: World Bank, https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2020/10/07/global-....
> Concentrating all manufacturing in China leads to power centralization
Employment in the Chinese secondary sector is almost static over the last ten years. GDP from the secondary sector as a percentage of GDP is down significantly. While the size of the secondary sector in absolute numbers, iirc, has gone up, this is due to Chinese manufacturings moving towards higher priced exports.
China will likely continue to be world's largest manufacturer for a long time. However, there is nothing that suggests that global manufacturing continues to centralize there, and there are a - very, very, large - number of signs suggesting that companies are off-shoring away from China to lower cost countries.
> as is evident, and forms the basis of creation of another hegemony.
To quote Game of Thrones, "Power is Power". Russia has an economy that is smaller than Italy's by several hundred billion dollars. Russia also has a blue water navy and nuclear weapons.
> The effectiveness of military power goes only so far.
Agreed.
> There is no realistic scenario where the US and China go to war.
We can agree to disagree here. There is no reasonable scenario, but there are a number of realistic ones.
> So China has great leverage and will continually nibble its way to global dominance.
Let's assume that China's economic and demographic issues are beginning to catch up to them, which is very common for middle income export-led countries with poor demographics. They share borders with two nuclear armed countries and several other highly developed countries. Their largest trading partner is their largest "adversary". Their lines of communication run through other countries, and they are dependent on other countries for their energy needs. China also happens to be a highly heterogeneous country, which has been concealed by a thin-veneer of nationalism.
In short, China much more closely resembles 19th century Germany than it does 20th century Russia or the United States.
> They share borders with two nuclear armed countries...
I thought China shared borders with the following nuclear-armed nations:
Pakistan
India
North Korea
Russia
I thought China shared borders with the following nuclear-armed nations:
Pakistan
India
North Korea
Russia
Poor Pakistan and North Korea.
Good point though, and I stand corrected. It's easy to forget just how large China is.
Good point though, and I stand corrected. It's easy to forget just how large China is.
"Russia has an economy that is smaller than Italy's by several hundred billion dollars."
This meme about Russia's economy being smaller than Italy's needs to die.
Russia is the 6th economy in the world, Italy is 13th with the difference being about 1.7 trillion dollars. GDP adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP) is the proper way to compare economies [1].
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)
[1] https://www.worldbank.org/en/programs/icp#6
This meme about Russia's economy being smaller than Italy's needs to die.
Russia is the 6th economy in the world, Italy is 13th with the difference being about 1.7 trillion dollars. GDP adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP) is the proper way to compare economies [1].
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)
[1] https://www.worldbank.org/en/programs/icp#6
> GDP adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP) is the proper way to compare economies.
Except that it really isn't. PPP is a way to forecast long term exchange rate convergence and not make "short run" comparisons. See Taylor, A. M., & Taylor, M. P. (2004). The purchasing power parity debate. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18(4), 135-158.
Going to my original point, Russian GDP from manufacturing in 2019 was $219.22 billion. Italy's GDP from manufacturing in 2019 was $298.4 billion. Italy does not have a domestic nuclear weapons program. Russia does. I don't hear about the Italian military in the news. Russia's is mentioned almost every day.
Except that it really isn't. PPP is a way to forecast long term exchange rate convergence and not make "short run" comparisons. See Taylor, A. M., & Taylor, M. P. (2004). The purchasing power parity debate. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18(4), 135-158.
Going to my original point, Russian GDP from manufacturing in 2019 was $219.22 billion. Italy's GDP from manufacturing in 2019 was $298.4 billion. Italy does not have a domestic nuclear weapons program. Russia does. I don't hear about the Italian military in the news. Russia's is mentioned almost every day.
"it really isn't"
You can't say 'really' and at the same time refer to an article with the word 'debate' in its title. Between World Bank's position and a single article I would take World Bank any time.
Take a look at the drop of the ruble to dollar exchange rate in 2014. Without adjusting for PPP this would mean that everything produced in Russia suddenly lost half of its value, which is absurd.
You can't say 'really' and at the same time refer to an article with the word 'debate' in its title. Between World Bank's position and a single article I would take World Bank any time.
Take a look at the drop of the ruble to dollar exchange rate in 2014. Without adjusting for PPP this would mean that everything produced in Russia suddenly lost half of its value, which is absurd.
To be fair, for militaries it is quite relevant as you generally don't want to outsource any of your military production so local labor rates which ppp approximates are highly relevant to military output.
> so local labor rates which ppp approximates
This is a short run comparison. See the article I mentioned earlier. There is little evidence that PPP comparisons, over a short period of time, are meaningful.
PPP is calculated by a basket of goods. There are valid reasons for why the price of, e.g., flour costs X in one country and Y in another country that have little to do with the purchasing power of their respective currencies. This is why there are a disproportionate number of island nations that have high price level ratios - it is expensive to import 'stuff', and this inadvertently increases how much this 'stuff' and what it is eventually processed into costs.
This is a short run comparison. See the article I mentioned earlier. There is little evidence that PPP comparisons, over a short period of time, are meaningful.
PPP is calculated by a basket of goods. There are valid reasons for why the price of, e.g., flour costs X in one country and Y in another country that have little to do with the purchasing power of their respective currencies. This is why there are a disproportionate number of island nations that have high price level ratios - it is expensive to import 'stuff', and this inadvertently increases how much this 'stuff' and what it is eventually processed into costs.
> There is no realistic scenario where the US and China go to war.
You can say that, but...
You can say that, but...
Hide your strength, bide your time
> The global pandemic, which started in manufacturing-centric China, continues to disrupt supply chains and draw attention from politicians calling for a reshoring of production. The United States is not alone; calls for reshoring can be heard around the world: in France, Germany, Australia, Japan, and South Korea.
> But is reshoring the answer to a nation’s manufacturing woes? Not completely. Better than reshoring is the broader concept of resilience — a manufacturing sector that can adjust in real time to supply chain disruptions anywhere while minimizing any loss to customers.
> The pandemic is inducing actions by U.S. manufacturers to enhance the resilience of their supply chains. And the government is not standing idly by.
Relevant excerpts on the topic from [The Emerging American Industrial Policy By Keith B. Belton ](https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2021/08/the-emerging-amer...)
> But is reshoring the answer to a nation’s manufacturing woes? Not completely. Better than reshoring is the broader concept of resilience — a manufacturing sector that can adjust in real time to supply chain disruptions anywhere while minimizing any loss to customers.
> The pandemic is inducing actions by U.S. manufacturers to enhance the resilience of their supply chains. And the government is not standing idly by.
Relevant excerpts on the topic from [The Emerging American Industrial Policy By Keith B. Belton ](https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2021/08/the-emerging-amer...)
Re-shoring something like electronics manufacturing is going to be quite difficult for those countries that outsourced it all to China.
For starters, you need factories i.e. physical buildings. Pick and place machines, machine shops for making precision plastic moulds, the trained personnel to run them and re-shoring all the knowledge for how things work and how to keep them working.
The entire supply chain for electronic components will also have to be re-shored as well. A lot of that depends on a local network effect (why Hong Kong was successful and why Shenzhen is successful).
In Australia we still have small pockets of electronic manufacturing (most of which was decimated by Japanese imports in the 1970s) so we are 50+ years from when things like that were routinely made here and rebuilding that is not going to happen at the stroke of a pen, it's going to require a lot of investment. That is something governments used to do quite well but the neo-liberal political movement not only killed manufacturing in this country, but also makes it impossible to restart it.
It costs me 1/10th of the price to have our circuit board made in China compared to the quotes I had from Australian factories. That is the kind of price difference that would kill my product stone dead.
For starters, you need factories i.e. physical buildings. Pick and place machines, machine shops for making precision plastic moulds, the trained personnel to run them and re-shoring all the knowledge for how things work and how to keep them working.
The entire supply chain for electronic components will also have to be re-shored as well. A lot of that depends on a local network effect (why Hong Kong was successful and why Shenzhen is successful).
In Australia we still have small pockets of electronic manufacturing (most of which was decimated by Japanese imports in the 1970s) so we are 50+ years from when things like that were routinely made here and rebuilding that is not going to happen at the stroke of a pen, it's going to require a lot of investment. That is something governments used to do quite well but the neo-liberal political movement not only killed manufacturing in this country, but also makes it impossible to restart it.
It costs me 1/10th of the price to have our circuit board made in China compared to the quotes I had from Australian factories. That is the kind of price difference that would kill my product stone dead.
Plastic injection molding tool design especially. It's not just capital intensive, but one of the deepest black arts I was adjacent to in my robotics days. I'm not sure I see a way to reshore that knowledge at any scale worth talking about without massive economic problems in the west. The way to learn (like any black art) is to start with simple designs and take on more and more complicated work, but the simplest designs are the ones with the lowest margins and the least worth reshoring. : \
Maybe the whole field changes with 3d metal printing getting cheaper allowing more experimentation by individuals and reducing the barrier to the field?
Maybe the whole field changes with 3d metal printing getting cheaper allowing more experimentation by individuals and reducing the barrier to the field?
It sure takes talent (like in most technology endeavours) but it still can be found in good old Europe. Our Lithuanian ME contractor is nothing but stellar. However his career path was not trickle up from 3D printing but a traditional engineering school.
Just want to underscore this point. The ability to produce complex molds quickly and cheaply is a huge advantage for China. Metal 3D printing however may indeed be a potential game changer here.
I wonder what exactly are their competitive advantage there
Materials cost? Salaries? Cheap CNC machines? Several mechanical engineers on call with long shifts?
Materials cost? Salaries? Cheap CNC machines? Several mechanical engineers on call with long shifts?
Experience.
The whole world is currently offshoring this work to Chinese firms who already have the experience.
The whole world is currently offshoring this work to Chinese firms who already have the experience.
Has it ever occurred to you that the answer might be that they’re just better at it than us due to decades of experience at scale?
Not to pick on you in particular, I see this sentiment a lot. China is no longer cheap labor, their dominance in manufacturing is due to expertise.
Not to pick on you in particular, I see this sentiment a lot. China is no longer cheap labor, their dominance in manufacturing is due to expertise.
I don't know how that is going to play out. The metal 3D printer I have seen was quite incredible with the things that could be made out of stainless steel powder but the price of them doesn't seem to be coming down at the rate we normally expect with electronics.
I guess once somebody works out how to do it as a desk-side or small factory, high volume situation it might turn things around pretty rapidly on a precision injection mould but there is little incentive to develop such a thing while we still have access to the chinese market, even for complex moulds.
You're right about injection mould design being a dark art, there is so much to be concerned about that just getting something to fall out of the mould cleanly might as well be magic.
I guess once somebody works out how to do it as a desk-side or small factory, high volume situation it might turn things around pretty rapidly on a precision injection mould but there is little incentive to develop such a thing while we still have access to the chinese market, even for complex moulds.
You're right about injection mould design being a dark art, there is so much to be concerned about that just getting something to fall out of the mould cleanly might as well be magic.
> The way to learn (like any black art) is to start with simple designs and take on more and more complicated work, but the simplest designs are the ones with the lowest margins and the least worth reshoring. : \
We could skip that step by hiring experts from foreign manufacturers. Pretty sure they would prefer USD over what they are making now (judging by the outflow of capital from Asia to the west).
We could skip that step by hiring experts from foreign manufacturers. Pretty sure they would prefer USD over what they are making now (judging by the outflow of capital from Asia to the west).
We could, if immigration wasn't a political poison pill
We're talking about a few highly qualified individuals in strategic industries.
And there's nothing preventing the addition of a "mentoring" clause where they have to train Americans with these technologies.
Operation paperclip would be a good place to look for an historical precedent.
And there's nothing preventing the addition of a "mentoring" clause where they have to train Americans with these technologies.
Operation paperclip would be a good place to look for an historical precedent.
Western countries need to infiltrate their factories and steal their schematics and technologies.
The first world uses their living conditions and high pay for that instead mostly - just give the right people worker visas. Most of the actual nationally conducted industrial espionage involved export controlled military industrial complex linked bits.
Business intelligence meanwhile is more about reverse engineering and observation while not crossing the red line into illegality. Things like deducing the state of thejr competitors by the number of cars in their lots at what time of day - "more cars at odd hours and weekends may hint at a frenzied rush and that they may be running behind schedule".
Business intelligence meanwhile is more about reverse engineering and observation while not crossing the red line into illegality. Things like deducing the state of thejr competitors by the number of cars in their lots at what time of day - "more cars at odd hours and weekends may hint at a frenzied rush and that they may be running behind schedule".
Modern business intelligence practices definitely borrow techniques well established fields such as OSINT and HUMINT, often bordering the life of illegality but never crossing it.
As someone who works in the reputation management industry, we often monitor major social media platforms for keywords and conduct sentiment analysis on individuals of interest. This is done with the intention of ensuring the correct narratives are understood by the public, and to ascertain potential internal threat actors/whistleblowers before they embark on their mission.
As someone who works in the reputation management industry, we often monitor major social media platforms for keywords and conduct sentiment analysis on individuals of interest. This is done with the intention of ensuring the correct narratives are understood by the public, and to ascertain potential internal threat actors/whistleblowers before they embark on their mission.
Oh man you must have some amazing stories. Any cool ones you could share?
One interesting note about this, is that there are machines for automating manufacturing that are explicitly not allowed to be exported.
source: friend who did factory liaison for USA companies in Shanghai
source: friend who did factory liaison for USA companies in Shanghai
Lol, you joke, but it's not like we're above that if push comes to shove. The trouble with a black art though is that it's hard to get the gist of what's going on just from what's written down.
The joke is that’s largely what happened when the west brought their tech to china
It's not like China is hiding this stuff. They do this to themselves as in their own employees regularly steal schematics and technologies and spread it all over the place.
Supply chain resiliency has less to do with "reshoring" then it does about common-sense redundancy to just-in-time manufacturing chains. Toyota understood this and has faired better then most through the pandemic, whereas most others stalled out and had no real recovery plans.
It's also crucial to note that the car companies in particular have managed to demonstrate a shocking lack of foresight here: half the problem with the chip shortage was executive panic at gasp maybe having old stock on hand, and completely mispredicting that car sales would go up and not down.
It's also crucial to note that the car companies in particular have managed to demonstrate a shocking lack of foresight here: half the problem with the chip shortage was executive panic at gasp maybe having old stock on hand, and completely mispredicting that car sales would go up and not down.
Peter Zeihan argues that we already started with deglobalizing the world. His arguments are quite convincing.
Life After Globalization (Peter Zeihan) - 2021 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kch4Z1GpNOQ
Life After Globalization (Peter Zeihan) - 2021 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kch4Z1GpNOQ
At least with tech there seems to be very little de-globalization. The vast majority of tech companies and even consumer products have both a workforce and customer-base that spans the globe.
A few outliers like Huawei make news but not a global trend.
A few outliers like Huawei make news but not a global trend.
I think we’re about to see this trend reverse - and fast.
Countries/EU started passing intense laws and regulations that means companies start operating differently in different places. Faang will stay for a while but listen to how many HN commenters skip the EU for GDPR reasons. We may soon see national scope app stores based on recent anti trust cases.
No one even tries to work inn China anymore. Japanese internet is still using Yahoo, and india is on-shoring their own industry fast. Russia practically has their own internet like China.
Big hosting companies are setting up smaller and more frequent data centers in each nation. Just look at the AWS Korea and Indian data centers as a map of what’s to come. Or cloudflare selling “hosted nearby” services. They’re selling shovels for a world where data hosting has national borders and export laws.
Countries/EU started passing intense laws and regulations that means companies start operating differently in different places. Faang will stay for a while but listen to how many HN commenters skip the EU for GDPR reasons. We may soon see national scope app stores based on recent anti trust cases.
No one even tries to work inn China anymore. Japanese internet is still using Yahoo, and india is on-shoring their own industry fast. Russia practically has their own internet like China.
Big hosting companies are setting up smaller and more frequent data centers in each nation. Just look at the AWS Korea and Indian data centers as a map of what’s to come. Or cloudflare selling “hosted nearby” services. They’re selling shovels for a world where data hosting has national borders and export laws.
"Russia practically has their own internet like China."
No, we do not. For example, Google and Yandex are intensely competing for the Russian search market.
No, we do not. For example, Google and Yandex are intensely competing for the Russian search market.
Edit: this wasn't supposed to be a "firewall" type comment, but that there are local-market entrants. Yandex is basically Russia only, and there is a handful of alts to American companies that are Russia only.
"Yandex is basically Russia only"
Not entirely. [0]
Here is Yandex’s market share in several countries (Statcounter, July 2019):
Not entirely. [0]
Here is Yandex’s market share in several countries (Statcounter, July 2019):
Russia: 48.79%
Belarus: 22.38%
Kazakhstan: 21.88%
Tajkistan: 15.12%
Uzbekistan: 11.87%
Turkey: 10.67%
Kyrgyzstan: 9.61%
Turkmenistan: 6.73%
Ukraine: 5.98%
Armenia: 4.20%
Moldova: 3.40%
Georgia: 2.85%
Azerbaijan: 2.06%
I've also noticed a re-onshoring trend at every company I've worked at. As more of the 'factory-work' of programming was automated the appeal of offshore developers has dropped. It's also tightly coupled with the increased wages demanded of offshore workers (good for them).
Zeihan made a particularly interesting point about 3D printing in one of his talks: Manufacturing is increasingly being moved closer to the consumer. Toyota pioneered a lot of this with their JIT system, moving the factories to the region the vehicles are being sold in, and retooling as needed based on what was selling. While we've seen a lot of failures of JIT in the past two years, we've also seen a lot of failures due to centralization and long supply chains, so the idea of deglobalization is probably making a lot of sense to a lot of people right now.
How does that square with the known vast benefits of economies of scale? That is why industries are dominated by megaconglomerates as opposed to a vast number of small practices.
Contrast that to say law firms and private practices of doctors. While there may be some law offices who warrant their own skyscrapers they don't come close to matching even insurance companies in centralization. Different situations may call for different approaches.
Logistically difficult and custom goods are where 3D printing and automated mills work especially well, and time sensitivity favor local approaches. If you make eyeglasses to order 99.99% of the time, prosthetics or similar then it makes sense.
Contrast that to say law firms and private practices of doctors. While there may be some law offices who warrant their own skyscrapers they don't come close to matching even insurance companies in centralization. Different situations may call for different approaches.
Logistically difficult and custom goods are where 3D printing and automated mills work especially well, and time sensitivity favor local approaches. If you make eyeglasses to order 99.99% of the time, prosthetics or similar then it makes sense.
Economies of scale and large scale manufacturing certainly don't go away, but decentralization does add robustness and nimbleness that a gigafactory can't. Geographic diversification also helps if you scale beyond a level that the area your current factory permits (or any location that makes sense to move it to).
Manufacturing processes are also changing thanks to automation and more general tools, like laser sintering 3D printers, that don't require extension retooling to make a completely different part. This is doubly true if savings from scale get nuked by shipping from wherever your factory is.
Manufacturing processes are also changing thanks to automation and more general tools, like laser sintering 3D printers, that don't require extension retooling to make a completely different part. This is doubly true if savings from scale get nuked by shipping from wherever your factory is.
Laws around law firm ownership also limits their size. They can’t have share holders and traditional corporate structures as we typically see in big biz.
If you're talking about the US, can you please post a cite of these laws? I've recently become interested in historical business law because I've read in passing one theory proposed that the massive US centralization of urban populations and the concomitant cost of living inflation is due in large part to US business domicile and operations laws that were repealed in the 80's-90's. That is, supposedly there were laws that for all practical purposes limited the size and centralization of US companies (hence my interest was piqued when you posted about laws limiting law firm sizes via ownership structuring permissions) by limiting specific aspects of their operations to within a declared domicile state.
I know that happened to banking, but the original poster claimed it was for nearly all US businesses. But I can no longer find that discussion nor the relevant laws, and I'm hoping trawling your cite(s) might lead me to them.
I know that happened to banking, but the original poster claimed it was for nearly all US businesses. But I can no longer find that discussion nor the relevant laws, and I'm hoping trawling your cite(s) might lead me to them.
Unfortunately I don’t have any good citations just IRL lawyer friends. Should be easy to google the rules though. IANAL but The rule is basically that law firms can only be owned by lawyers. The idea being (i think) that lawyers have a legal responsibility to their clients and that’s be corrupted via existence of shareholders (or, shareholders without legal responsibility too).
Regarding your theory, I think it’s bunk. There has been a consistent trend to centralized big companies throughout American capitalism long before the 80s. Just look at the history of GE. In fact, the growth of index funds actually indicates a shift away from big corps (or at least big corps with disparate business groups) because investors can pick and choose markets better without relying on conglomerates to do that for them.
But it should be obvious that massive urban centers are not due to US laws… because we have 1k+ years of cities before that with good documentation of life and laws in those cities.
Regarding your theory, I think it’s bunk. There has been a consistent trend to centralized big companies throughout American capitalism long before the 80s. Just look at the history of GE. In fact, the growth of index funds actually indicates a shift away from big corps (or at least big corps with disparate business groups) because investors can pick and choose markets better without relying on conglomerates to do that for them.
But it should be obvious that massive urban centers are not due to US laws… because we have 1k+ years of cities before that with good documentation of life and laws in those cities.
The “general" rule here is Rule 5.4 of the ABA model rules [0], though the actual rules in a particular jurisdiction (state) may be different since the model rules are not the actual rules of any State. Note that this doesn't actually prohibit any particular structure (well, implicitly it prohibits publicly traded corporations), it just prohibits non-lawyers from being stockholders (if a corp) or partners in a law firm or (except as part of an employee compensation within a law firm) having a claim on revenue generated by lawyers through the practice of law.
[0] https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibili...
[0] https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibili...
Yep. For every 3D printer printing passable products at the edge, there will be some crazy advanced and inimitable machine in a factory with an elite team putting out very high quality products at scale... Both models will succeed.
> economies of scale
there's also diminishing returns. there's an optimal point of factory size.
there's also diminishing returns. there's an optimal point of factory size.
Gotta love how you can't add the video to "watch later" because it's classified as "YouTube Kids".
YouTube sucks.
YouTube sucks.
Whenever this topic comes up I think of the opening lines to Romance of the Three Kingdoms:
The world under heaven, after a long period of division, tends to unite; after a long period of union, tends to divide. This has been so since antiquity.
The world under heaven, after a long period of division, tends to unite; after a long period of union, tends to divide. This has been so since antiquity.
It would be good to see some breakdown of "real" flows of stuff vs valuations. A lot of east asian exports are low margin, and a lot of US assets have crazily increased in value. This may make the US appear more self-contained, but doesn't reflect the actual material self-sufficiency of the place.
The mythical "cost of embargo" can tell very different story.
The mythical "cost of embargo" can tell very different story.
So low margin high volume versus lower volume high margin? Anyone have ideas where to look for data on that? Or what a decent proxy could be?
It is not possible to deglobalise unless you you have a 1+ billion population in your country AND don't screw up at the same time. USSR is a perfect display of a country which desperately and seriously tried to deglobalise and failed at both points.
If anything globalisation is only accelerating, but changing form. Big industrial agglomerations become more and more independent producing the select set of stuff which they specialize in, and then integrate with other agglomerations across the globe.
If anything globalisation is only accelerating, but changing form. Big industrial agglomerations become more and more independent producing the select set of stuff which they specialize in, and then integrate with other agglomerations across the globe.
There's so different kinds of globalization, physical and virtual/informational.
I think informational globalisation is on the way up. The internet has made it easy to do knowledge work globally, and the pandemic has normalised it. Broadband is becoming pretty ubiquitous, and projects like Starlink should make it easier to ignore geography when it comes to information, knowledge work, culture and entertainment. I live in India, work for a company in the US, write SaaS apps that are used and paid for globally, watch movies and read books from all over the world, and have working relationships with people I've never met.
Physical globalisation is cutting down, on the other hand. India is trying a major push towards self sufficiency, and from what I can see there's a lot of cottage/home industry coming up for food, localised farming, clothing, mechanicals and infrastructure. The "import everything from China, it's cheap" philosophy is no longer the default option — it's turning into "buy local". I actually think this is a good thing — having industry decentralised is more anti fragile, and probably good for the environment, economies of scale be damned.
So yes and no, depending on which aspect of life you're talking about.
I think informational globalisation is on the way up. The internet has made it easy to do knowledge work globally, and the pandemic has normalised it. Broadband is becoming pretty ubiquitous, and projects like Starlink should make it easier to ignore geography when it comes to information, knowledge work, culture and entertainment. I live in India, work for a company in the US, write SaaS apps that are used and paid for globally, watch movies and read books from all over the world, and have working relationships with people I've never met.
Physical globalisation is cutting down, on the other hand. India is trying a major push towards self sufficiency, and from what I can see there's a lot of cottage/home industry coming up for food, localised farming, clothing, mechanicals and infrastructure. The "import everything from China, it's cheap" philosophy is no longer the default option — it's turning into "buy local". I actually think this is a good thing — having industry decentralised is more anti fragile, and probably good for the environment, economies of scale be damned.
So yes and no, depending on which aspect of life you're talking about.
Raw materials are not abundant everywhere, so globalization is here to stay (even if that means that regional wars will be fought to secure supply of these materials).
Maybe the value of the materials traded will erode since we will value tech and virtual “materials” higher and higher, but the actual flows of physical materials cannot go back to where they were 50 years ago, unless a global war erupts and the global standard of living and population goes to hell.
Maybe the value of the materials traded will erode since we will value tech and virtual “materials” higher and higher, but the actual flows of physical materials cannot go back to where they were 50 years ago, unless a global war erupts and the global standard of living and population goes to hell.
I hope that this isn't because more of the population is adopting a zero-sum view which increases the likelihood of war.
I think globalization may setback but in long term it will pick up.
Back in late 19th century Britain managed to pull off a globalization through empire building, advancements of technology as well as global trading. The two world wars and the cold war put globalization on hold for seventy years, but then US picked it up and started the second trend, which gradually see setback after the financial crisis.
Back in late 19th century Britain managed to pull off a globalization through empire building, advancements of technology as well as global trading. The two world wars and the cold war put globalization on hold for seventy years, but then US picked it up and started the second trend, which gradually see setback after the financial crisis.
Hey, it's possibly cyclical. The end of the Pax Romana resulted in the collapse of Mediterranean trade for centuries - if you think of the ancient mediterranean world as a smaller form of "global" there might be some historical parallels to the waning of the current "system."
It looks like it may have reached a plateau. I would be surprised it it reversed, especially with the anti-immigration sentiment that seems so common in the developed world right now.
https://twitter.com/adam_tooze/status/1421115868117979137
https://twitter.com/adam_tooze/status/1421115868117979137
I personally fear that in a de-globalized world, there is a higher chance of a third World War. Of course, there is the policy of M.A.D, but that seems like such a weird place to be in.
Absolutely. I think we're returning to a multi-polar situation like we had prior to WWI. Without a clear global hegemon - great power competition could definitely lead to a major war.
To be honest, we are already in a multi polar situation. USA is still a superpower, China is definitely one. Russia is not "super" but it is reemerging as a force to contend with. The OPEC Countries are one bloc of their own. Then there are places like Iran, Venezuela, Cuba that are somehow immune to foreign pressure.Then there are countries like India where we play on many sides.
COVID and the resulting supply chain issues certainly highlighted the need to produce basic necessities (e.g. food, medical supplies, antibiotics) rather than rely on imports. It remains to be seen whether it goes further than that.
Lack of redundancy got exposed. To globalize or not to globalize is entirely different from relying on one source for everything. We seriously have no where else to get semiconductors other than Taiwan? That has absolutely nothing to do with the pros/cons of globalizing and everything to do with having a bus-factor of one.
I'm always sad that in these kind of global statistics, each EU country is treated separately. When comparing big powers like US and China, I would expect the European Union to be represented.
There is a small problem though.
What are you going to do with the UK? Count it in? Count it out? or have a big, artificial jump in the charts at the time of Brexit?
What are you going to do with the UK? Count it in? Count it out? or have a big, artificial jump in the charts at the time of Brexit?
If the graph wants to show long term trends then the obvious choice is to count it out since right now and for the foreseeable future it'll be out
If your objective is to write an history book about early 2000s and you want to put a chart then you'd count it in and have a big drop with a footnote
If your objective is to write an history book about early 2000s and you want to put a chart then you'd count it in and have a big drop with a footnote
Good catch! :)
But I would say count it out, since else the UK statistic would be 0 for some time :D. So it's "historical GDP of the current EU"
But I would say count it out, since else the UK statistic would be 0 for some time :D. So it's "historical GDP of the current EU"
I think it's natural that the world is deglobalizing. As we move away from fossil fuels a massive amount of trade that flows across borders will disappear in the next 30 or so years.
If you think fossil fuels will vanish from our lives in the next 30 years, think again. For sure, more Developed countries will make more significant strides for sure but the way I see it we are surrounded by products that use fossil fuels. Plastics are an easy example that are used in almost every industry in one form or another in our daily lives.
Petroleum based products are also used in several industries. For example, the electronic, the pharma industry (https://orionmagazine.org/article/medicine-after-oil/) and the manufacturing industry etc.
The elephant in the room is cars and the power generation. Cars will become increasingly electrical for sure but in colder climates, I don't see how the electric cars are yet able to solve that issue . This is due to the fact that electric cars are simply not as good as in warmer climates(https://www.insidehook.com/article/vehicles/can-electric-car...). Power generation is probably going to have a major revolution quite possible but unfortunately, many people are still against nuclear power and wind/solar will require massive investments that I only see developed countries being capable of doing so.
I can't say we will be able to remove fossil fuels from our lives so quickly considering our whole society has been extremely dependent on it. Especially not so soon.
The elephant in the room is cars and the power generation. Cars will become increasingly electrical for sure but in colder climates, I don't see how the electric cars are yet able to solve that issue . This is due to the fact that electric cars are simply not as good as in warmer climates(https://www.insidehook.com/article/vehicles/can-electric-car...). Power generation is probably going to have a major revolution quite possible but unfortunately, many people are still against nuclear power and wind/solar will require massive investments that I only see developed countries being capable of doing so.
I can't say we will be able to remove fossil fuels from our lives so quickly considering our whole society has been extremely dependent on it. Especially not so soon.
I never said vanish. Transportation makes up a massive proportion of fossil fuel use and many states in the US are outright banning the use of fossil fuels for transportation within the next decade. So I don't think I'm reaching when I say that in the next 30 years fossil fuel use will disappear for transportation.
> many states in the US are outright banning the use of fossil fuels for transportation within the next decade
Source?
Source?
>As we move away from fossil fuels a massive amount of trade that flows across borders will disappear in the next 30 or so years.
You did say disappear. I agree transportation will have the most amount of progress but where it is warmer all year round.
You did say disappear. I agree transportation will have the most amount of progress but where it is warmer all year round.
I am biased, but I certainly hope so.
I work in a company that makes stuff for robots and if that manufacturing comes back from China, no matter where it then goes to, the market for robots is going to go up massively.
Because there is no way you can produce most of the stuff we make in China cost effectively without massive number of robots.
I work in a company that makes stuff for robots and if that manufacturing comes back from China, no matter where it then goes to, the market for robots is going to go up massively.
Because there is no way you can produce most of the stuff we make in China cost effectively without massive number of robots.
It's a tough cookie either way. China is cheap because it doesn't have the same safety regulations (overtime, social security, healthcare insurance, occupational safety, and so on). It needs a more advanced economy (that has a better input-output value ratio, so its productivity needs to increase) for it to be able to factor in the cost of those "luxuries".
of course a big problem is that the created economic productivity is not distributed in an equitable way, it tends to be captured by the elites (let's say Jack Ma, but of course the political elite is even more powerful and rich in many aspects). automation tends to amplify this effect. (capital vs labor)
If some countries/regions decide to not do business with China then that will have a twofold effect. First China loses business, which means unemployment, internal tensions, and likely fallback to producing less valuable things, which means that there will be even less economic surplus to spend on those "luxuries". And second, that region now needs to find different trade partners, which is a disruption in trade, supply chains, which has a cost. (Which could be spent on a lot of other things, eg. education, infrastructure.)
Of course this is hard, because it's a coordination problem. Were the participants able to find a good solution magically then it'd be great, but usually their own short/medium term interests override the long term ones.
of course a big problem is that the created economic productivity is not distributed in an equitable way, it tends to be captured by the elites (let's say Jack Ma, but of course the political elite is even more powerful and rich in many aspects). automation tends to amplify this effect. (capital vs labor)
If some countries/regions decide to not do business with China then that will have a twofold effect. First China loses business, which means unemployment, internal tensions, and likely fallback to producing less valuable things, which means that there will be even less economic surplus to spend on those "luxuries". And second, that region now needs to find different trade partners, which is a disruption in trade, supply chains, which has a cost. (Which could be spent on a lot of other things, eg. education, infrastructure.)
Of course this is hard, because it's a coordination problem. Were the participants able to find a good solution magically then it'd be great, but usually their own short/medium term interests override the long term ones.
Samsung phones are made in Vietnam?!
Talking about those I just fixed my Play installation by "uninstalling" in settings, which really reinstalls the original one and re-updates.
This is the second time my Android phone nukes itself (by popping up "App is crashing, closing it" over and over again) without any interaction from me, because of some hidden update; last time it was Chrome, and the fix is always to reinstall the offending app which not a single help page in the whole internet describes!
I'm building my own phone: http://radiomesh.org
Talking about those I just fixed my Play installation by "uninstalling" in settings, which really reinstalls the original one and re-updates.
This is the second time my Android phone nukes itself (by popping up "App is crashing, closing it" over and over again) without any interaction from me, because of some hidden update; last time it was Chrome, and the fix is always to reinstall the offending app which not a single help page in the whole internet describes!
I'm building my own phone: http://radiomesh.org
Democratization by globalization failed miserably.
So we better deglobalize before it is too late and reduce the influence of dictatorships like China, Russia and Saudi-Arabia on our free world.
So we better deglobalize before it is too late and reduce the influence of dictatorships like China, Russia and Saudi-Arabia on our free world.
We're continuing to witness an unprecedented growth of wealth all across the world, especially in the poorest countries. The only "failure" of globalization is the fate of the first world's working class which no longer enjoys the privileged position it had in the twentieth century.
Growth of wealth is not the same as democratization or an improvement in the human rights situation. Saudi-Arabia is very wealthy, but journalists get cut into pieces, when they dare to criticize the government. In China you can be very wealthy, but when you criticize the government you will simply vanish. And in Russia you will be poisoned or just fall out of the window, if you are not useful for the government anymore. Whats the point of all the growth of wealth, if basic human right are violated every day in these countries?
In fact a growth of wealth in these countries even makes the situation worse, because wealth stabilizes a regime. Instead first a country must democratize and only afterwards it should be allowed to profit from global trade.
In fact a growth of wealth in these countries even makes the situation worse, because wealth stabilizes a regime. Instead first a country must democratize and only afterwards it should be allowed to profit from global trade.
> Saudi-Arabia is very wealthy, but journalists get cut into pieces, when they dare to criticize the government. In China you can be very wealthy, but when you criticize the government you will simply vanish. And in Russia you will be poisoned or just fall out of the window, if you are not useful for the government anymore. Whats the point of all the growth of wealth, if basic human right are violated every day in these countries?
This is awful, but it's not something that ever have been significantly better in any of these countries.
This is awful, but it's not something that ever have been significantly better in any of these countries.
Economic metrics are still very good in the West despite a pandemic. Europe is lagging behind a little but certainly not enough to be deemed a failure
that's a meaningless falsifiable claim.
there are valid critiques of the (neoliberal) concept of "just open up the markets and rich merchants will usher in proper democracy", but those need a bit more sophistication than "guys globalization totally failed thanks for coming to my TED talk".
democracy itself needs thousands of conditions to flourish. there are no silver bullets for organizing societies.
there are valid critiques of the (neoliberal) concept of "just open up the markets and rich merchants will usher in proper democracy", but those need a bit more sophistication than "guys globalization totally failed thanks for coming to my TED talk".
democracy itself needs thousands of conditions to flourish. there are no silver bullets for organizing societies.
When what we absurdly call “globalization” only concerns the free movement of capital, but not the free movement of people, of course this is the result..? What did anyone expect from wildly increasingly the leverage of capital?
This type of pseudo-globalization is a recipe for inequality, and thus instability.. regardless of how many ideologically motivated “economists” gave their blessing to this idiotic idea.
This type of pseudo-globalization is a recipe for inequality, and thus instability.. regardless of how many ideologically motivated “economists” gave their blessing to this idiotic idea.
I don't see a problem with that.
I am happy this is happening. Doing business with authoritarian governments is a very very bad idea and the policymakers should have known this.
I have been avoiding stuff that comes from China for many years it makes feel happy you know that i am not funding the biggest global mafia
I have been avoiding stuff that comes from China for many years it makes feel happy you know that i am not funding the biggest global mafia
Good article by paul krugman: https://outline.com/FTZ8eN
Basically in the article he outlines what the economists didn't get right and then pointed out that globalization caused virtually all income inequality. That the damage done has basically enabled the existence of people like Trump or movements like Brexit.
The irony is that Krugman still doesn't see the forest through the trees. Not to mention big changes like many countries agreeing upon a minimum corporate tax rate. Which gives huge advantage to anyone who doesn't play ball. Though this is now less to do with economy anymore.
This is bipartisan. Trump started the war with China, and Biden pressed the gas pedal. Tons of countries are clearly declaring their intentions and allies. You can clearly see where this goes, there is no alternatives. However, it's not going to be China as the victor. Sure they have all the factories and largest standing army of any country. They'll not be pulling any trigger and be accepting their depression; see Greece for what is about to happen to China. Followed by a peasant revolt.
Basically in the article he outlines what the economists didn't get right and then pointed out that globalization caused virtually all income inequality. That the damage done has basically enabled the existence of people like Trump or movements like Brexit.
The irony is that Krugman still doesn't see the forest through the trees. Not to mention big changes like many countries agreeing upon a minimum corporate tax rate. Which gives huge advantage to anyone who doesn't play ball. Though this is now less to do with economy anymore.
This is bipartisan. Trump started the war with China, and Biden pressed the gas pedal. Tons of countries are clearly declaring their intentions and allies. You can clearly see where this goes, there is no alternatives. However, it's not going to be China as the victor. Sure they have all the factories and largest standing army of any country. They'll not be pulling any trigger and be accepting their depression; see Greece for what is about to happen to China. Followed by a peasant revolt.
Ideally R&D and manufacturing would be spread all over the world,with short supply chains. Ideally regions wouldn't be very dependent on what happens on very distant other regions.
Globalization is a bell that can't be unrung, but neoliberal globalism (financial & cultural) is definitely in retreat.
I hope so at least in some regard such as manufacturing, self reliance on resources and intelectual capital.
Korea is missing.
typo at: Vietam
typo at: Vietam
For globalization to disappear most modern forms of transport and communication need to break down.
The metaverse is a new kind of globalization
I meant this in a positive way. Thanks for the negative karma, clowns
Concentrating all manufacturing in China leads to power centralization, as is evident, and forms the basis of creation of another hegemony.
The effectiveness of military power goes only so far. There is no realistic scenario where the US and China go to war. So China has great leverage and will continually nibble its way to global dominance.