Yao Yang at UW Madison: China’s Slowdown – Structural or Cyclical

Presentation at UW Madison (sponsored by CEAS), on Friday, April 12th.

[link]

 

15 thoughts on “Yao Yang at UW Madison: China’s Slowdown – Structural or Cyclical

  1. Moses Herzog

    Looks like a good one, hope we can watch a “live stream”. I don’t happen to agree, but listening to opposing views often raises one’s knowledge base. Hope Mr. Yao gets a warm welcome and some better food than McDonalds (unless he “has a jones” for one, and then by all means).

  2. Moses Herzog

    May be going north for a small holiday this summer. First long trip vacation I have taken in awhile. May get some Chinese at a nice restaurant in Emporia Kansas on our way up. My Dad used to take us there when he still drove and was still amongst the living. Will be over 30 years since I ate there but judging from online pics the interior hasn’t changed much. Will be a super weird feeling eating there, somewhat wistful but fun. Will have to stay away from the beer that day. Horrid. Oolong tea was so good there as I recall, so that’ll have to fill in for the beer. Oh, horrid, God save me. No, but I like Oolong tea. Really. Honest. Oh, Horrid, Roman Gods of the sky what the hell am I saying?!?!?! Horrid. Oolong tea, yeah…….

  3. pgl

    https://international.wisc.edu/redcap-lecture03-2015/

    Yao to lecture on understanding China’s economic growth
    Posted on March 18, 2015
    Yao Yang, dean of the National School of Development and director of the China Center for Economic Research at Peking University in Beijing, will deliver a free public lecture on Understanding the Political Economy of China’s Economic Growth on Tuesday, March 24, at the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus. Yao, who earned his Ph.D. in agricultural and applied economics at UW-Madison in 1996, will discuss his recent research into what he refers to as “the Chinese system of selectocracy” and how this has influenced China’s economic growth.

    1. Moses Herzog

      So tempted to say something here. Anyone wanna guess the word that I’m thinking of?? Think “more Sino-semantics BS” and you’re apt to come close.

      1. Moses Herzog

        Rachel Maddow’s new book “Prequel” really touches on this, if not specifically related to trade, pretty damned close in proximity. A lot of German investment in America at that time, and I wager other democratic nations as well. And American corporations supportive of Nazi policy.

      2. pgl

        Not that Stevie will either read or understand this paper but this is an interesting read:

        The first great trade collapse: The effects of World War I on international trade in the short and long run
        David Jacks Simon Fraser University

        https://www.sfu.ca/~djacks/research/publications/The%20First%20Great%20Trade%20Collapse.pdf

        World War I changed the landscape for many economic, political, and social variables. And naturally, international trade was no exception. In this chapter, I document the evolution of world trade up to the precipice of World War I and the implosion of world trade in the initial years of the war, along with important changes in the composition of trade. Chief among these was the dramatic erosion in the share of Europe in world exports
        in general, and in the share of Germany in European exports in particular. Turning an eye to more long-run developments, World War I emerges as a clear inflection point in the evolution of the global economy. The diplomatic misunderstandings, economic headwinds, and political changes introduced in its wake can be discerned in the data as late as the 1970s.

        The view from the precipice

        With the rise of antipathies between China and the US and the attendant – albeit somewhat remote – possibility of armed conflict, more than a few commentators have drawn parallels between the present day and the time immediately before World War I (Coker 2015). Then, as now, a once unquestionably dominant power contended with a new industrial upstart, but one influential school of thought held that there were strong
        countervailing forces assuring that this rivalry could remain contained and find its primary expression in the commercial and diplomatic realms. In the most famous and (perhaps unfairly) maligned contribution to this literature, Angell (1910) argued that as a pure economic proposition, a generalised and protracted European war was futile due to the various linkages put in place by decades of globalisation and the integration of financial, goods and services, and labour markets. Futile though it may have been, World War I was to have devastating effects on the global economy of the day, and
        nowhere was this seen as clearly as in the patterns of international trade, one of the most exposed and sensitive sectors of economic activity.

        He presented data to confirm Dr. Chinn’s point and more.

      3. Steven Kopits

        I think the parallels between China and WWI should not be overstated. Were the belligerents even threatening each other prior to 1914? By contrast, China is a mortal threat to every country on the face of the planet. Germany or Russia were not even a mortal threat to Britain, much less the rest of the world, in WWI. The comparison with WWII Japan is more compelling, where the US banned oil exports to Japan as well as its silk trade. The US was the primary supplier of oil to Japan pre-war. That sort of dynamic is emerging with China as well. It puts Hawaii squarely back in play, just as it was with Japan, and for the same reason. Hawaii controls the Pacific.

        The decoupling of China from the RoW is already well underway.

        From CNN:
        It has been a year since China reopened its borders, but despite loosening its stringent Covid-19 restrictions, foreign travelers have been slow to return to the country with numbers down more than 60% from pre-pandemic levels.

        https://www.cnn.com/travel/china-foreign-visitor-number-2023-intl-hnk/index.html

        FDI at 30 year lows
        https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/BX.KLT.DINV.WD.GD.ZS?locations=CN

        Lots of sanctions against China after 2019
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_sanctions_against_China#:~:text=From%202020%20onward%2C%20the%20US,of%20Ukraine%2C%20and%20fentanyl%20production.

        https://apnews.com/article/biden-china-investment-ai-national-security-dd6a5b138e6c7cba31468dc89f776e8d

        China Intensifies Push to ‘Delete America’ From Its Technology
        https://www.wsj.com/world/china/china-technology-software-delete-america-2b8ea89f

        Why is this happening? From the US side, because China appears to be a military threat. From the Chinese side, because China appears to be preparing to be a military aggressor. From Bloomberg:
        China on Track to Be Ready to Invade Taiwan by 2027, US Says
        https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-03-20/china-on-track-to-be-ready-for-taiwan-invasion-by-2027-us-says?embedded-checkout=true

        I think China’s domestic crackdown and external belligerence are very much having an effect on FDI, tourism, trade, and related sanctions.

    1. pgl

      Hey Stevie – why not stay silent until you listen to his presentation? After all – your question is rather sad and stupid so maybe (just maybe) you might learn something for a change.

    2. Macroduck

      Are you asking about China’s trade with Taiwan and the Philippines?

      Anyhow, you can look up the numbers as well as anyone. (Well, I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt.) If you check, I’m confident you’ll find that China does a good bit of trade with all the countries it’s threatening.

    3. Macroduck

      I have documented in comments here Russia’s two-and-a-half decade effort to recruit fellow travelers from among right-wingers in the U.S. The success of that effort is evident in the behavior of the Freedom (sic) Caucus in the House, among NRA members, and in comments to this blog. (Also among Europe’s right-wing politicians, but that’s not the point here.)

      The fact that Stevie carries water for China seems much a part of the same shift in allegiance among right-wingers from their own country to authoritarian rulers abroad. China threatens its neighbors – our allies – but Stevie questions only our response to China’s threats. China limits trade far more than the U.S., but Stevie pretends the problem is with the U.S.

      “I shift my allegiance from the flag
      Of the United States of America,
      And from the Republic for which it stands,
      To cleave the nation, now divisible,
      With liberty and justice only until I work my master’s will.”

  4. Moses Herzog

    Can anyone confirm this will be livestreamed on Facebook?? It is implied if nothing else on the FB page.

  5. Moses Herzog

    I think about, all the many many times, my Chinese teacher colleagues (that;s flattering myself by labeling myself a “teacher”) and my Chinese students invited me to their home, some of my students were from poor families, and the dinners they had no business giving me. That was 98% in Liaoning China. They fed me like I was a mandarin bureaucrat from Beijing, And they had no business being so incredibly kind and gracious to me. And I think the latter part of my days there, my stomach full from drinking alcohol before I entered the family’s door. and then after all their planning to make me happy I ate 10 bites, I feel incredibly guilty now when I think about it. PLease somebody or many peoples invite Yao Yang to YOUR home or a very nice restaurant Please treat this man like a KING, and make up for my American (or just my own) rudeness while I was in China.

    —Please for my sanity—–Moses Herzog

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