RE: joefongo China and fiscal conservatism"In the past couple of years, I am becoming a fan of the managed economy and rise to global power. " - joefongo
As I read this, I rewrote it for fun. "In the past couple of years, I am becoming a fan of the managed economy and the decline in global power--witness the United Socialist States of America (USSA) and the significant loss in financial, economic and strategic hegemony." Not what you had in mind? :-)
jf, Maybe you are just a fan of fiscal conservatism? We haven't seen much fiscal conservatism here in North America at the federal level for quite some time. When "Trust me, I'm an economist" Stephen Harper cut the GST value-added sales tax twice and raised expenditures YOY at much faster rates than the Liberals ever did, he set the Canadian federal government on course for a structural deficit.
All North American special-interest group pandering aside, I believe the Chinese have done a good job overall of assuring surpluses and investing those surpluses. This fiscal discipline won't prevent the Chinese economy from further slowing--that looks inevitable at this point--but the Chinese economy should recover from this slowdown 1) in good shape, and 2) much faster than would have otherwise been the case.