You have missed the most important economic story in the past 20 years

[whatthehey]

33. Well that and historical, and economic, blindness

The problem for medieval traders was finding anything the Chinese wanted from Europe in order to buy their goods at the end of the Silk Road. This was really only solved by the massive gold and silver finds in the Americas. Of all the precious metal Spain grabbed from the New World, China ended up with the most by a country mile. It was only the foolish insularity (ironic that) of the later Qing emperors and the military superiority of the West that temporarily moved the balance of economic power westward over the last century or two. And even now people piss and moan about the imports from China, then ignore the $150B in US exports. Same with "our" jobs over there (what exactly made them our jobs in the first place?) and the 1.7T in foreign investment, but forget the 1.1T in Chinese investment in return. Sure there is a negative balance in both, butthat's what happens between richer and poorer trading partners. Ironically, the very wealth transfer they decry will eventually lessen, and perhaps even reverse, that imbalance and the Chinese will worry about "their" jobs, which will still be a silly notion in either direction, going to the US service and capital goods sectors.