
Trump Plans New Curbs on Chinese Investment, Tech Exports to China - handsomechad
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-plans-new-curbs-on-chinese-investment-tech-exports-to-china-1529883988
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rayiner
What I don’t understand about opposition to this is what economic theory says
that one-way trade freedom serves US interests. China doesn’t let US companies
buy Chinese companies. Leaving aside notions of fairness, what is the
theoretical basis for arguing that the US should nonetheless allow Chinese
ownership of US companies?

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yding
I've seen economists argue that most of the benefits of low tariffs actually
comes from increased imports. Increasing imports increases the consumer
surplus from the cheaper goods and is an easy way to increase a country's
standard of living without much effort.

Singapore, Switzerland, Hong Kong, and Macau all have 0 import tariffs, and
rather than mass unemployment they are incredibly rich by international
standards.

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be_jenk
Those are also a tiny fraction of the size of the USA and China and have few
rural poor communities to consider

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yding
Right, which is why they are not conclusive evidence that 0 tariffs are
suitable for everyone, like some economists would suggest.

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yding
One big open question about this policy is whether it will severely restrict
Chinese VC investment in the US. There's been discussions about subjecting all
Chinese VC investment to the CFIUS, which would effectively stop all but the
very largest deals.

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neonate
[http://archive.is/2qDIu](http://archive.is/2qDIu)

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alottafunchata
Good.

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rory096
It should be noted that Steven Mnuchin disputes this report's accuracy:

>On behalf of @realDonaldTrump, the stories on investment restrictions in
Bloomberg & WSJ are false, fake news. The leaker either doesn’t exist or know
the subject very well. Statement will be out not specific to China, but to all
countries that are trying to steal our technology.

[https://twitter.com/stevenmnuchin1/status/101125820718296678...](https://twitter.com/stevenmnuchin1/status/1011258207182966786?s=19)

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addicted
This is the most transparent non-confirmation confirmation he could have
possibly given. The US has only been discussing one country in the context of
stealing technology. And if there are smaller countries whose companies are
trying to steal technology that have been discussed but not reported (probably
because they are tiny) it’s unlikely their companies are trying to buy US
companies.

