South American Economics/China-Latin American Relations Thread
- Thread starter Strangelove
- Start date
big deal for Brazil. Getting Brazil is so difficult if you don't have a car.
Even car is hard. Their roads are terrible, even the locals would rather fly between Rio and Sao Paolo than drive. Intracity is much easier than intercity.
Per capital GDP
Military spending
% renewable energy
Costs of starting a business
I recommend watching this video to get a better idea of why Latin America is now much more comfortable defying the US nowadays.
It’s pretty simple - when they deal with the US, they get imperialism. When they deal with China, they get modern factories, railroads, ports, and actual infrastructure.
For decades, when Latin America was left to the US’s devices, it went nowhere. But with China’s win-win cooperation, the region is finally rising together.
Yeah, the US might still have higher total FDI, but most of it is low-value service sector investment - call centers, McDonald's, Starbucks, Walmart, banking, and financial services.
Basically, the same low-value-added nonsense that also defines much of the US economy. Nothing transformative.
Meanwhile, China is offering high-value-added manufacturing, which has massive positive ripple effects on economic activity.
And even if we leave manufacturing out of the equation, just think about how important cheap, high-quality civil infrastructure is for any economy to grow.
The US simply can't offer any of that. That’s why its nominal GDP is useless for projecting economic influence - because it doesn’t translate into anything tangible for other countries.
And it’s not just basic infrastructure either - China also leads in high-tech digital infrastructure like 5G, data centers, and renewable energy.
And let’s not forget - China doesn’t just extract raw resources. It builds local processing plants and even full-fledged EV factories.
Also, as China's standards of living rise, it will also be able to afford more and more agricultural imports from Latin America too.
If an emperor (the US) only uses the stick but fails to bring any real benefits, his rule won’t last - eventually, the people will overthrow him.
Domination alone isn’t enough; there has to be an incentive to stay under his influence.
The Monroe Doctrine is dead because the US can no longer offer Latin America anything of value.
It can only offer destabilization and lectures about problems like mass immigration and drugs that they helped create in the first place.
Without economic benefits, loyalty disappears, and alternatives - like China - become far more attractive as we are currently witnessing.
More and more leftist governments are rising in the region precisely because of this shift - the US no longer holds the same grip it once did. And what does it still fully control?
Ecuador, Paraguay, and a few other small players? Compare that to a decade ago, when US influence was far stronger. The tide has turned.
Last edited: