Be Careful When You Start Name Calling....

 You need to get out more. 

Seriously. 

It's sort of like the soft-rock group " England Dan and John Ford Coley" in the early 1970s. Hell, we all thought they were from Great Britain when in reality, they were from Dallas, Texas. Sitting here in SE Texas, we well, don't have a very good " worldview." 

I know I am speaking to the author, editor( I suck at editing), publisher of this blog. 

The Vice-President of this country got into trouble by calling the Chinese " Peasants."  

Never mind they hold most of America's government debt.

Now in country of 1.4 billion people( China's population) there is going to be an underclass of people. And about 400 million still live in a rural agricultural setting. And yes, they are poor. 

And until 2018, we didn't know what to really think of China. Then our world changed. We get off a plane in Houston, and literally as we walk in from Ireland, the phone rings and my son is getting married in a couple of months, in China. 

Not going to lie, we were afraid of going there.....

We went to Hong Kong first that, "Let's ease into the Chinese Experience." 

And Hong Kong is a massive world class city, center of banking, well, it's like visiting any other major city. Just with an Asian flair. ( Former British Colony, Hong Kong is well, "different.")  

We finally get to Kunming. A town most of us never even heard of. 

In China, they have Tier cities. They're ranked in order of importance to the nation. Kunming is in the far Southwestern part of the country, away from most of industrialized coast and North. It is, as my daughter in law calls it a " Very Small City." It only has 10 million people. New York City only has 8 million people by comparison. Again, a nation of 1.4 billion.

Kunming is a Third Tier City in China. 

We literally expect the worst. 

We get off the plane in Kunming, and drive into the city. There are literally high-rise construction cranes everyplace. I counted at least 23. There are massive buildings. It looks like something you'd see in the old cartoon show, " The Jetsons."  The first major business I see as we drive into town is a massive Land Rover dealership, and it is bigger than any car dealership I've seen ever, Houston has nothing like this. 

(When we flew home into Houston, we went over downtown. It pales by comparison to Kunming.  )

Now the dealership is not a showing of the average Chinese. They're middle class, drive Mazda, Toyota, Honda like cars. They all live in high rise buildings, with three bedrooms. 

EVERYONE is engaged in commerce. You think we are capitalists? The Chinese are the definition of capitalism. Everyone is making, selling something. Yes, the central government calls themselves Communist, and their government sucks, sucks bad, but the average Chinese on the street is hustling, trying to make an RMB( Their money). And they're not afraid to work 7 days a week, 18 hour days.

The kids over there go to school 6 days a week. 5 days in regular school, Saturday to get ahead, trouble is, they all are trying to get ahead. And Sunday? In the morning if your parents are nice, you get to play, but after lunch? Hit the books.  

Now I don't know what is going to be the final outcome of the tariff business, but in the Chinese mind, they are saying to themselves, we don't sell to America? Fine, we'll sell to someone else. There are 7 billion people in the world and the USA is only 4.2% of the population. We'll find another 4.2% of the world's population to sell our goods. 

Here is my concern, how much will we hurt US farmers in this change? 

Folks, these people are not peasants. They make a smaller wage, yes, but costs over there are cheaper. Much so. 

Trouble is, if business stops with commerce to China, what happens? Does it come back to America? Already tariff threats to other nations are coming down. Business won't be making toasters in Mississippi, or Barbie dolls in Missouri, or Fruit of the Loom boxers in Florida, business will move the plants to Vietnam, or Indonesia, or India. Those with lower tariffs. ( India now has the world's largest population at almost 1.5 billion, and they're looking for work. )

Someone said the other day that an American made Barbie would cost right at $310. " Sweetie you're only getting this Barbie from Santa and maybe some Reese's Pieces."  Maybe....

I am not being an apologist for China, I am not. I was scared several times dealing with government authorities. I would and wouldn't like to go back. I literally have a Chinese Q1 Visa that allows me to travel back and forth. ( Chinese Family Visa) I would love to visit Macau. I want to visit the old German colony cities. You ain't had Chinese food until you've been in China.( But you might be eating donkey or worse.) We were in a part of China in which I saw no other " Blue Eyes" other than my family in a month. Vacationers do not go there. ( I so wish I would have carried a Texas flag with me to hang on our condo balcony on the 27th floor....Then again, I'd probably be still sitting in some Chinese prison. )

I need at some point to talk about Credible Threat Theory in economics, and have tried to write it, but I've made it either too hard or I've went too far the other way, making the theory non-understandable. 

I'll work on it some more....