ICYMI:Russia and China swallow up strategic businesses in the US heartland

[blondebanshee]

China has become the largest buyer of US real estate, earning local political clout

For the people of Moraine, Ohio December 2008 was a time no one ever wants to think about or see happen again. Thousands of jobs were lost when General Motors closed its assembly plant as the Great Recession kicked into gear.

Today, as US manufacturers continue scaling back industrial production in the Midwest, Russia and China are sinking their teeth into the rubble left behind, employing thousands and thus commanding significant economic and political clout in regions desperately in need of jobs and broader revival.

Over the past seven years, China has become the largest buyer of US real estate. Though a far smaller player in the American economy, Russian majority-owned businesses employ between 5,000 and 10,000 workers in the US.

Despite US president Donald Trump’s very public lambasting of Beijing and the ongoing trade war, China has become a key economic actor in southern Ohio and Illinois. Five years ago, the Chinese business mogul Cho Tak Wong bought the former General Motors assembly plant in Moraine turning it today into the world’s largest automobile glass factory.

Fuyao Glass America has now created more than 2,000 jobs in Moraine, set to rise to 3,000 in the next few years, and invested $600 million (€544 million) in the process. The plant is believed to bring $280 million to Ohio every year – no small change for the economically depressed region.

“We have also indirectly created 3,800 jobs,” Fuyao North America’s president Jeff Liu says. Fuyao also owns a glass supply plant in Illinois, where it has invested millions of dollars more.

Prior to Fuyao’s arrival, the huge 140,000 sq metre disused factory served as a constant reminder to locals of the travails the region faced. Since the 1960s, the Dayton area has lost around half its population as manufacturing jobs dried up.

more at the link:

[link:https://www.irishtimes.com/business/manufacturing/russia-and-china-swallow-up-strategic-businesses-in-the-us-heartland-1.4047547|

[Newest Reality]

1. America First...of course.

Gee, look who's investing in America! Yay. Maybe they will buy most of what's left up in a pennies on the dollar fire sale after the Trumpression? Well, they will have to share with our blessed and valuable Oligarchs, I guess.

America for sale! Be first!

[Baitball Blogger]

2. They're also going to buy a following.

[Tanuki]

3. Don't forget the Russian aluminum plant built in Kentucky after Moscow Mitch blocked sanctions

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-a-mcconnell-backed-effort-to-lift-russian-sanctions-boosted-a-kentucky-project/2019/08/13/72b26e00-b97c-11e9-b3b4-2bb69e8c4e39_story.html%3foutputType=amp

"In January, as the Senate debated whether to permit the Trump administration to lift sanctions on Russia’s largest aluminum producer, two men with millions of dollars riding on the outcome met for dinner at a restaurant in Zurich.

On one side of the table sat the head of sales for Rusal, the Russian aluminum producer that would benefit most immediately from a favorable Senate vote. The U.S. government had imposed sanctions on Rusal as part of a campaign to punish Russia for “malign activity around the globe,” including attempts to sway the 2016 presidential election.

On the other side sat Craig Bouchard, an American entrepreneur who had gained favor with officials in Kentucky, the home state of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Bouchard was trying to build the first new aluminum-rolling mill in the United States in nearly four decades, in a corner of northeastern Kentucky ravaged by job losses and the opioid epidemic — a project that stood to benefit enormously if Rusal were able to get involved.

By the next day, McConnell had successfully blocked the bill, despite the defection of 11 Republicans.

Within weeks, the U.S. government had formally lifted sanctions on Rusal, citing a deal with the company that reduced the ownership interest of its Kremlin-linked founder, Oleg Deripaska. And three months later, Rusal announced plans for an extraordinary partnership with Bouchard’s company, providing $200 million in capital to buy a 40 percent stake in the new aluminum plant in Ashland, Ky. —".....(more)

[UTUSN]

4. Wait a minit!1 China bought, FIVE YEARS AGO so the jobs go to OBAMA!1