Slow Growth in China Is Good News for U.S. Jobs
For the past 15 years, China’s economy has been booming because of their large manufacturing industry. However, times are shifting and, China is moving away from dependence on exports. Stephen Roach, a senior fellow at Yale University said, “China is changing from a producer model to a consumer model. That’s an enormous opportunity for the U.S.” Because of the changes in China, the U.S. could see a huge influx of jobs.
The U.S. economy is also experiencing a shift. Businesses are starting to favor made-in-America products because that is what consumers want. So, they are creating jobs in the U.S. instead of outsourcing to China and other countries. China’s slowing economy would further support this effort. The financial crisis in 2008 is still hurting the U.S. economy, and the slow growth in China is definitely good news for U.S. jobs.
At the same time that China’s export market is slowing, they are becoming consumers. That means that the U.S. could soon be exporting more products to China. The whole situation is normalizing the competition. Americans lost millions of jobs to china between 2000 and 2012 and that will no longer be the case. Of course, Chinese competition is not going away. It just won’t be as one-sided as it used to be.
Even though more manufacturing jobs in the U.S. will likely be creating over the next decade, that does not mean wages will support the cost of living. Businesses in the U.S. will still choose to outsource their manufacturing if the cost of manufacturing in the U.S. is not competitive. So, it’s kind of a lose-lose situation. The U.S. will get more jobs, but they are not necessarily good jobs. With time, wages should come up, but it will take time. Consumers must continue to demand made-in-America products for real wage growth to happen.
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