Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Will China overtake us as the largest economy in the world?

There has been a growing fear the past couple of years that China's economy will overtake the United States as the largest in the world. I am here to debunk that myth and explain a few things.

1. This fear is nothing new to us Americans. We thought the exact same thing about the Soviets, Japanese, and Germans all at different points in time. Did any of them overtake us in GDP? No. Why should China be any different? China is the manufacturing powerhouse of the world now, and people think the sheer number of factories they have is enough for them to eventually overtake us. What people fail to realize is that the people working in these factories make barely enough money to put food on the table. They are literally starving. There is no established minimum wage in China and they get absolutely no benefits. While they are getting paid 40 cents and hour with no benefits, American workers are making $30 an hour and getting all sorts of benefits. We are living the dream. Don't worry folks, we still have the good jobs. At least for now. Yes, we are outsourcing a lot of jobs overseas (Dell and Nike are a few names that come to mind), but keep in mind they are working the "crappy" jobs that us Americans don't want to work.

2. The other day someone said something along the lines of "so what if China overtakes us as the largest economy? Why will that matter?" Well, even though I do not think it is going to happen, I will explain why this does infact matter. America established itself as the superpower of the world after World War II. We have since been the superpower of the world and have gone uncontested (except for the Soviets, but we know what happened to them). China overtaking us would be a huge blow as that means they would have enough GDP to invest in their military much like we do. What happens to the last bit of oil on Earth? Don't you think they would want to fight us for it? The answer is obviously yes. We cannot and will not let China overtake us.

Thanks for reading!

49 comments:

  1. Interesting read! It's most definitely a possiblity

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  2. Great post, man. Very explanatory.
    I never really thought this through: "what would happen if china overtakes the us"
    that's some pretty serious shit but, as you said, i never believed this is gonna happen.
    (sorry for my broken english heh)

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  3. China's economy is pretty crazy. I've never thought of it like this. Scary world.

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  4. If we went to war with china we would be crushed... we have almost no raw factories... and they have a ton

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  5. America needs to get it's stuff together so we don't let this happen.

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  6. I dont think it will happen either

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  7. It is posible... we'll see

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  8. china wont be the only country passing the US.

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  9. U.S. is dying, move to Canada.

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  10. It is extremely undesirable to allow China to become a dominant world power. As you say, should they grow as big as we all fear, they will hold major sway in world politics, and it is unlikely they will be as reliable as America and the UN in terms of mediating war, peace, poverty, economy etc.

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  11. Thank you for writing; This are the question that we have to ask us every time and then, what the future will bring?

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  12. i think it will, the country as a whole works much harder than the average american and to top it off they have more geniuses in china than we have people in the united states. i feel its only a matter of time...

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  13. Well, if China starts funding the technology to resurrect Lu Bu, then I'll tell you: we're proper f***ed.

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  14. I think it's bound to happen, thru sheer force of numbers. Following.

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  15. stop making me face reality I'd like to be an American who lives in shameful ignorance thank you

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  16. I don't think it's just possible, I think it's pretty darn probable.

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  17. You have a good grasp on economics.

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  18. China does not have the coordination to launch an attack remotely as powerful as the US would

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  19. That would be kinda crazy, nice clear up though.

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  20. I sure hope it doesn't happen D:

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  21. They're lots of outlandish rumors about this. America would crush China militarily, period.
    America has to worry about a new world currency, as long as the dollar is the world currency we're not completely taken a dive.

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  22. Very interesting post, we'll see in time. Following !

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  23. It'll be interesting to see what happens with the China - U.S.A. dynamic in the coming years. Nice read, thanks!

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  24. Hope the US turns itself around.

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  25. It's hard to beat them when they basically have slave labor. AKA mindless drones who are raised to work for the hive mind and don't realize there's more to life than working 14 hour days and living in cubicles to make pennies.

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  26. The economy seems to be a massive con to make us think that our money actually means something. Lol no.

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  27. Pretty sure China could obliterate us, especially in a war of attrition.

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  28. My first blog post was about this. It will happen. Not a matter of if--but a matter of when.

    Very interesting post. Great detail and concise too!

    Thank you for sharing! Definitely following :)

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  29. Well I honestly think the world will change soon. Economics are suffering a crisis actually and it can not live longer the way it did in the 20th century. China might be cheap and poor, but what these guys have is a long lasting tradition and something that us western guys miss more and more: Diligence because of confusian tradition.
    However what buggs me more than fear of China taking over world economics is the environment damage they do. While we slowly learn to care for our environment, China doesn't give a damn (even when they tell different).
    Furthermore, Soviet Russia was no economic compeditor but a military one. They had a complete different idea of economics (and their idea failed) and been driven not by money but by ideology to become the no.1 leader.
    China is different, they are like ants that work for their society not for personal earnings.

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  30. Ah and btw. If Japan had a bigger land and nearly as many people as America or Europe, they would have taken over already. They went from a closed backward middle-age society that was totally crushed after WWII to a big economic player in less than 50 years. A way the western world needed centuries to walk they did in less than a half with their kamikaze morale.
    Just to point the drive of the eastern people. Now China just opened their economics and the are as eager as the japanese. Give them a half century...

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  31. Nice points and mostly accurate. Good job.

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  32. China already hold EU by the balls via Greece, Spain, Italy, Hungary and some other states and bonds trade. The could if they would want to do it, be the dominant force in no time.

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  33. It will be interesting to see how the world changes in the next 50 years or so. Interesting blog - followed!

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  34. yeah the media just spin it into a 'end of the world' thing

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  35. I don't think any of us can predict the future, especially on this scale.

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  36. If america keeps spending all their money on various military campaigns then china who (as far as I know) is just progressing will eventually grow bigger than the U.S. I don't mind America being world police, but if that means they'll run their economy down in the mud then FUCK NO!

    Just what I think :)

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  37. Of course they will. While our politicians have been putzing around trying to maintain the status quo, China has been working overtime to overtake us. They're a huge country with a huge population with totalitarian central planning. Its going to happen.

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  38. The thing that hurts China is how bad there housing market is. The cost of living is like 32x the average annual salary. In Japan during the mid-90s, considered the worst housing bust in history, it was only 12x.

    Also, China surpassing the US isn't a bad thing. Except for the environment, but that's a completely different story.

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  39. If China sells all the Dollar it holds, USA would be insolvent.

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