September 23, 2011
The NYT ran a Reuters column in its business section that told readers that China lacked the ability to support the world economy. The piece essentially argued that China will act in its own interest, not the interest of floundering economies in the United States and Europe.
This piece ignores the actions that China is already taking. China’s government has bought more than $1 trillion in U.S. government debt to keep up the value of the dollar, in order to sustain its export markets in the United States.It is virtually certain to lose money on these bonds because the dollar will inevitably fall when China stops buying up vast amounts of dollar assets.
This means that China already spends huge amounts of money to sustain its export markets. Switching to purchases of euro zone debt or guarantees of this debt would simply mean redistributing some of the money that China spends to support its export markets, it would not be a change of policy.
On a per dollar basis, China’s purchases and guarantees of euro zone debt would almost certainly have far more impact on sustaining its exports than the marginal purchase of U.S. government debt. A collapse of the euro would almost certainly lead to a double-dip recession not only in Europe, but also the United States. This means that if China were to continue its policy of using its currency purchases to support its exports, it should be shifting from supporting dollar to supporting the euro.
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