Chinese tourists Buying “Made in China” in the US – Part 1/2

May 6, 2011


Shaun Rein, a CNBC contributor, reported, “China is on the verge of overtaking Japan as the world’s largest consumer of luxury good, spending $13 billion, or 22 percent of the world total, in 2010.”

However, In Who Buys Guccis and Omegas in China? Not Just the Billionaires, Rein says, “Only 40 percent of the $13 billion worth of luxury items sold to the Chinese last year were transacted (bought) in the country.”

Reign says that is because it is 30 percent cheaper to buy luxury products in another country due to taxes and tariffs.

There is another reason why many Chinese tourists buy “Made in China” in other countries.

While my Chinese father-in-law and his wife were visiting in the US, I learned why Chinese buy in the US — quality.

If you read the China Law Blog, you may know that in China there are several levels of quality that do not exist in the US.  When buying anything in China, there is always a risk you may end up buying a fake or the real thing but of a lower quality.

From what I have read at the China Law Blog, it seems there is no way to tell which level of quality you are buying when in China.

That doesn’t mean “Made in China” is always of a poor quality. The language of the contract between the foreign buyer such as Apple and the Chinese manufacturer is important.

In fact, most of the products Apple sells globally are assembled in China and many are manufactured there too (Apple has manufacturing facilities spread around the world but assembles most of its expensive electronic items such as the iPad in China).

This explains why the Chinese in China often if not always make sure a computer or a TV (along with other merchandise) works before buying and taking it home.

Continued on May 7, 2011 at Chinese tourists Buying “Made in China” in the US – Part 2 or discover the Copy Cat Middle Class in China.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | America, business, capitalism, China, Chinese middle class, economy, tourism | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Bald Eagle Capitalism

April 24, 2011


The Economist’s cover for the March 12, 2011 issue of what the British call a newspaper disguised as a magazine had a cover with Bamboo Capitalism splashed in big print over a picture of a bamboo forest with people riding red butterflies.

The Economist says, “China’s success owes more to its entrepreneurs than its bureaucrats.”

 True, but The Economist also says China’s economic success has often been vaguely attributed to “capitalism with Chinese characteristics”… taken to mean, “Bureaucrats with heavy, visible hands have worked much of the magic.”

Hmm, I never saw it that way. I don’t think the Party in Beijing sees it that way either or cares what anyone in the West thinks.

Although The Economist goes on to point out that government bureaucrats have less to do with China’s success than most think, it is a fact that government intervention in China’s economy helped China survive the 2008 global financial crises caused by America’s obese, debt ridden, diabetic, cancerous capitalist economy, which I have termed Bald Eagle Capitalism.

Bamboo Capitalism is a good term to identify China’s “capitalism with Chinese characteristics”.  In China, bamboo is considered a symbol of luck. It is flexible. People may eat part of it. It stays green most of the time. It is used in construction, to cook food, make floors, furniture, etc. In ancient times, warriors used bamboo as armor.

The flexible way Chinese entrepreneurs are allowed to do business is the primary reason for China’s economic success, but the central government’s control over property values and banking also deserves credit — an area the US government turned a blind eye to, which led to the 2008 global financial crises and about 64 trillion dollars in global losses along with tens of millions of lost jobs around the world.

The documentary Inside Job revealed the infamous Wall Street architects of the 2008 global financial crises and how they are still in charge at the same jobs where they caused the crash in the first place.

If these same men and women had lived in China, China’s bureaucrats may have quickly executed them so the same crises might not happen again as soon as it may repeat in the West.

In fact, Bald Eagle Capitalism is a fit term to describe the US economic system.

The Bald Eagle is not only the national bird, it is a bird of prey and although it will eat fresh fish, its primary source of food is from carrion, which vultures (a term to describe the people behind the 2008 global financial crises) feed on too.

The Bald Eagle’s diet is opportunistic and varied. The Bald Eagle will also eat the garbage from campsites, picnics and dumps.

Bald Eagles are an endangered species, as is the American economy.

Discover how High-Tech Entrepreneurs Thrive in China

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | America, business, capitalism, China, economy | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

How a Unified Korea becomes a Win-Win for China and the U.S.

March 21, 2011

I subscribe to Imprimis, a publication of Hillsdale College.  While finishing my morning exercise routine on the stationary bike, I read an essay written by Sung-Yoon Lee of Keeping the Peace: American in Korea 1950 – 2010.

Professor Lee is an adjunct assistant professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and an associate in research at the Korea Institute at Harvard University.

He writes of the pressure North Korea has applied on the United States to sign a peace treaty that might require US troops to leave South Korea.  Professor Lee feels this would be a mistake, and I agree.

He says, “It is important for Washington to hold quiet consultations with Beijing to prepare jointly for a unified Korea under Seoul’s direction, a new polity that will be free, peaceful, capitalist, pro-U.S. and pro-China.”

This is the first I’ve read anywhere in a Western media source (and Hillsdale College is decidedly conservative in its political stance, which I don’t always agree with) that it is possible a country could be both pro-U.S. and pro-China at the same time.

In fact, Hillsdale College is often anti-leftist (liberal) and anti-entitlement to the point that it has rejected accepting Federal aid even in the form of student scholarships since almost every entitlement dollar from the Federal government comes with strings.

By saying that a unified Korea under Seoul would be both pro-China and pro-U.S. admits China is not the evil dragon so many in the West believe.

When Mao ruled China, North Korea and Communist China seemed as if they were evil twins.  However, today that is not true. In the 1980s, China emerged as a hybrid one-party republic with term limits and age limits so one man would never rule the Middle Kingdom again as Mao did for 26 years.

China became a hybrid capitalist-socialist economy while politically it was an authoritarian one party republic guided by the 1982 Constitution.

Prior to 1911, there was the imperial aristocracy, a “small” middle class (with an emphasis on small) and a huge peasant class living in severe poverty with hard labor and short life spans.

Today, China’s middle class has reached about 300 million and almost 500 million are connected to the Internet, and China’s attempt at censorship does not totally control the flow of global information to those that want it who then share what was learned through Chinese Blogs and e-mails with friends, fans and family.

North Korea is frozen in time, but South Korea and China have evolved and adapted to the global economy.  It would be in China’s interest to see North Korea merge with South Korea and become a capitalist nation open to the world for trade.

In fact, China does more trade with South Korea than the North, which by all accounts is a burden since China often feeds many of North Korea’s citizens to avoid famine sending food grown in China that should have gone to Chinese consumers.

If Korea is unified under Seoul’s leadership, the threat of war in Korea will evaporate.

However, under Pyongyang’s leadership. Korea becomes a larger threat to both China and the US and more difficult to contain.

The US must maintain a military pretense in South Korea and I’m sure China agrees even if it never says so publicly since a war between Pyongyang and Seoul would not be in China’s interest economically.

Learn of China in 1950 Korea Protecting the Teeth

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

7 Comments | America, business, capitalism, China, Chinese history, Communism, history, politics | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

The KMT–CIA Heroin, Cocaine Pipeline to the US

March 20, 2011

The CIA, in an alliance with the Nationalist Chinese (KMT), addicted millions of Americans on drugs such as heroin and cocaine to finance a covert war against the spread of Communism.

The KMT’s leader was the brutal, authoritarian dictator Chiang Kai-shek of Taiwan, which the US still supports. Chiang Kai-shek ruled Taiwan with an iron fist until his death.

However, it wouldn’t be until the 2000 presidential election in Taiwan that the KMT’s hold on power came to an end there.

I first learned of the KMT-CIA drug pipeline into the US in the early 1980s when I read of Congressional hearings leading to the closing of Air America, a covert airline owned by the CIA that was one of the methods used to move illegal drugs out of Southeast Asia and into the hands of US citizens.

While writing of all things Chinese, I forgot about the Nationalist (KMT) Chinese generals that worked with the CIA during the Vietnam war to supply American troops in Vietnam and addicts in the US with heroin and cocaine in trade for weapons.

After the Chinese Communists under Mao won the Civil War in 1949, a large force of KMT troops in southern China fled to the Golden Triangle of Southeast Asia, which is located in Laos, Thailand and Burma. That’s when the KMT became involved in the drug trade with the CIA.

For reminding me of this dark chapter of America’s history (which evidence says is still an open book), I thank a ’21st Century Marco Polo, who is a committed and experienced human rights and legal education professional with a history of working internationally throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

Kevin Ryan writing for 911 Blogger.com reviewed American War Machine written by Peter Dale Scott.

Ryan writes, “This book examines a wide-ranging number of covert US operations since World War II, and, among other things, demonstrates that many of these operations were intimately connected with, and dependent on, illicit drug trafficking….”

The Senophobic, American capitalist obsession with everything Communist led the US down this dark path that introduced an expressway of  heroin and cocaine into the US in what may contribute to the eventual failure of the most successful and powerful democracy in the history of humanity.

I have embedded a four part series of an audio transcript of a 60 Minutes broadcast of the CIA controlled drug trade.


60 Minutes on CIA Drug Smuggling – Part 1

 


60 Minutes on CIA Drug Smuggling – Part 2

 


60 Minutes on CIA Drug Smuggling – Part 3

 


60 Minutes on CIA Drug Smuggling – Part 4

To understand the impact on US society, Drug Rehabs.org says, “The trafficking of illicit drugs burdens various components of domestic financial sectors as individuals and organizations frequently engage in illegal activates to generate income in order to purchase drugs or finance drug trafficking operations. Mortgage fraud (think 2008 financial crises which originated in New York), counterfeiting, shoplifting, insurance fraud, ransom kidnapping, identity theft, home invasion, personal property theft, and many other criminal activates often are undertaken by drug users and distributers to support drug addictions…”

Did you know that Mao, after winning the Chinese Civil War (1926 to 1949) between the Communists and Nationalists, ended drug trafficking and drug use in China in about 24 hours?

Illegal drugs wouldn’t return to China until after Mao’s death when China joined the WTO and opened its doors to world trade.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

2 Comments | America, American culture, business, capitalism, China, Chinese history, Communism, economy, environment, military, politics, Taiwan | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Western Minds may have it Wrong about China Building Empty Cities

March 13, 2011

World Net Daily quoted Patrick Chovanec, an expatriate and business teacher at Tsinghua University in Beijing, saying, “Who wants to be the mayor who reports that he didn’t get 8 percent GDP growth this year? Nobody wants to come forward with that. Therefore, the incentives in the system are to build. And if that’s the easiest way to achieve growth, then you build.”

What Mr. Chovanec is referring to is China building empty cities by the dozens then connecting them with expressways.

Although Mr. Chovanec has an impressive resume, I’m sure China’s leaders did not confide in him, which explains why he may be wrong.

In fact, what World Net Daily doesn’t mention is in the last thirty years China had the largest migration in recorded history of almost 300 million people moving from rural to urban China as it became an export nation resulting in the expansion of China’s urban industries.

The People’s Daily wrote in 2003, China was encouraging the migration of between 300 to 500 million people from rural areas to towns and cities by 2020, a transformation that Beijing hopes will help drive growth but which will also fundamentally alter the economy of the world’s most populous nation.

“A country where most of the population is in poor or remote villages will not be a modern and developed nation,” said Wang Mengkui, minister at the State Council’s Development Research Centre. “Our urbanization rate [of 39 per cent now is equivalent only to that of the UK in the 1850s, that of the US in 1911 and that of Japan in 1950.”

Wang Mengkui says, “I think our urbanization rate should reach 55-60 per cent of the population by 2020.”

Where do Mr. Chovanec and World Net Daily think China is going to house all those people as they move from rural to urban China?

Unlike democracies, where chaos, lobbyists and political agendas lead to mostly short-term decisions without planning for the future as in America’s case regarding the HUGE federal deficit and what I wrote about in India Falling Short, China’s leaders tend to plan long-term goals that benefit the most people.

China’s leaders have demonstrated for millennia (not just China’s Communist Party) that China’s collective culture often plans decades and centuries into the future, which explains the success of projects such as the Great Wall and the Grand Canal, which took centuries to complete.

This same long-term thinking led to modern, empty towns being built in Tibet years ago that are now filling with Tibetan nomads  (I wrote of this in an earlier post) that suddenly found the grass they depended on to feed their herds gone due to global warming ending a lifestyle that had survived for centuries.

China’s leaders — being scientists and engineers instead of economists such as Mr. Chovanec — studied the potential future and planned for it, which is a benefit of being an autocratic one-party republic instead of a chaotic democracy that depends on short-term goals and quarterly profits to guide the decisions of accountants and lawyers.

What China is doing by building these empty cities, roads and railways is getting ready for the future.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of My Splendid Concubine [3rd edition]. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

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5 Comments | business, China, cultural differences, economy, environment, government | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
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