In other news: West funds oppressive Arab states. Really, if we didn't want them spying on people, we shouldn't be giving them all that oil money. Funding terrorists is illegal, why is funding oppressive governments OK and then it's suddenly not OK when they spend that money to oppress people?
Importing goods from non-democratic countries is not an all-or-nothing proposition. The externality created by giving non-democratic countries cash issued by democracies can be partially corrected by assessing a unilateral scaling tariff on imports, in proportion to the level of human rights abuses created by the country of origin.
>"Importing goods from non-democratic countries is not an all-or-nothing proposition. The externality created by giving non-democratic countries cash issued by democracies can be partially corrected by assessing a unilateral scaling tariff on imports, in proportion to the level of human rights abuses created by the country of origin."
So lets apply that to Chinese imports. Let say that the US places one of the highest tariffs on Chinese imports since its one of the least democratic countries[1]. So China's economy grinds to a halt. But China is one of the largest purchasers of U.S debt so now both China and the U.S economies completely tank[2]. And then that has knock on effect on Africa where China is buying up minerals and investing in infrastructure projects. This would effectively tank the economies of North America, Asia and Africa. Does this still strike you as a viable idea?
China had exports of 2.3 trillion dollars in 2016. 16.9% of which was to the US[1].
.5% of trillion is 5 billion. Let's just round down China's exports down to 2 trillion.
That means the US would be levying 10 billion dollars in tariffs on China during the first year alone and this would continue to increase for the next 4 decades?
How do you imagine China would react to that? Do you imagine a trade war would be good for the world economy?
This is the kind of nonsense that Trump was recently spewing during the US election season.
You know who's going to actually pay that tariff? The U.S.? They will pay for it in higher prices on goods and perhaps more importantly they will also pay for it in China financing 100s of billions dollars less of U.S debt in the coming decades. That might be the kick in the pants the US needs to get its deficit in order but before wreaking lots of havoc.
You realize that China is the United States second largest creditor right? Until very recently they were the United States largest creditor[2]. Yes China finances the United States by buying up U.S Treasuries.
How do you propose that will happen exactly? Democracy is usually born out of stability, not revolution. Honestly, I hope China goes the way of Korea and slowly transitions into a more democratic country, but that is hardly a given. And revolutions in China have a nasty history of leaving millions of people dead/displaced and plunging the country into chaos.
edit: after writing this comment, I'm not comfortable with my assertion. Democracy in England was established (or reinforced) after the English Civil War and Glorious Revolutions, democracy in the US after the Revolutionary war and in France after the French Revolution.... so I take that assertion back.
So anyone that drives a car, buys anything that contains plastic, uses fertilizer, crayons or detergent is a "sponsor of terrorism" and an "oppressor"? That's absurd.
> if we didn't want them spying on people, we shouldn't be giving them all that oil money
Yes, but if we did something reasonable such as enact scaling import tariffs on exports from non-free countries in proportion to their level of human rights abuses as measured by a legislative scorecard of objectively observable public criteria, the neoliberals would claim that they learned tariffs were bad in Econ 101 and therefore that domestic tax policy on importers must be set by the WTO.
