Chinese Economics Thread

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Lieutenant General
It remains "better to have a global unified system" playing to standardised rules, he told an audience of investors on the sidelines of the World Business Forum in Hong Kong.

"But I understand entirely that if the Congress will not allow the (IMF's) governance system to appropriately reflect the changing economic weights, then I understand why other countries would say 'let's take our marbles and go home'," Bernanke said.

"It's not a good development" to have competing institutions, "but I can understand why China and other countries might want to say 'well, we're going to set up our own system'".
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Lieutenant General
No China..no TPP?o_O

"If a company is looking for low wage labor, they've already left, they're not here anymore," he told KVIA, an ABC affiliate in El Paso, Texas.

Obama was also personally appealing to lawmakers.

One of them, Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-La., said that he is leaning against the bill, but that Obama lobbied heavily. "He made an aggressive pitch" in their most recent talk, Richmond said, with the president stressing the possible benefits of trade to the New Orleans ports.

But Richmond suggested the White House has failed to mount a coordinated campaign. Richmond said pro-trade business interests in his district "didn't contact me until this week," whereas he has gotten anti-fast-track calls for months.

Richmond said he told Obama that the president's phone call was the first one to ask him to support fast track, and "I think that shocked him."

Democratic opponents, meanwhile, were stepping up their criticism and rebuffing Obama's lobbying efforts.
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Blackstone

Blackstone

Brigadier
Interesting and informative piece on China's garment industry in the Quartz.

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Among shoppers in the West, the
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(pdf) that “Made in China” indicates—to put it bluntly—junk. Many still prize labels boasting a product was made in, say, Italy—even if a growing number of Italian products come from factories that are
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.

But the quality of Chinese-made clothes is rising fast. China’s garment industry has been investing in manufacturing technology and training for decades now, and its workforce has collectively gotten better at stitching and assembling garments as China makes a growing share of the world’s clothes.

There are still dim, claustrophobic sweatshops—
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, sadly. But China is also home to a highly skilled, highly specialized garment industry, one that supply chain managers of global mass-market clothing brands, and even some high-end labels, regard as offering the best mix of price, speed, and—yes—quality.

“If I was to make a basic men’s jean, I’d make that in Pakistan,” Edward Hertzman, co-owner of the trade publication Sourcing Journal, tells Quartz. “If I was going to make a fashion woman’s garment, I would move to China because their skill set is better, their hand is better, their finishing is better, and they can handle that type of fashion.”

The industry has become so specialized that entire cities in China may center on manufacturing particular types of clothing. In her book Overdressed, author Elizabeth Cline marvels at the existence of a city near Shanghai that makes most of the world’s socks—about 9 billion pairs a year—and another in Zhejiang Province with around 5,000 factories all making children’s clothing. “There’s also a Sweater City and an Underwear City,” she writes, “where huge volumes of each are churned out in highly concentrated areas.”

That intense focus allows factories to become extremely proficient.

Indeed, luxury fashion labels now routinely make things in China. Burberry, Armani, and Prada have all
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, because it’s cheap but also because they’re still able to get good workmanship for the price. Even the Japanese brand Visvim, known for its
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, produces
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there.

Miuccia Prada makes about 20% of Prada’s collections there. And, she told the
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, “Sooner or later, it will happen to everyone because [Chinese manufacturing] is so good.”

China also has its own burgeoning,
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, featuring Chinese designers who make their elaborate creations in their home country.

The oft-repeated analogy for China’s manufacturing progress is Japan’s evolution. Now regarded as a paragon of precision and efficiency, it too once had a
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. Toyota and its method of “
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” helped the country rehabilitate that image, and in fact some Chinese garment manufacturers have followed Toyota’s lead specifically. (It’s a particularly apt comparison because Toyota
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, not cars.)

For Roger Lee, CEO of Hong Kong’s TAL Group, “lean manufacturing” is essential to his operations. The giant shirtmaker, which says it produces
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in the US, operates 10 factories, including two in China. “Before, if you started production of a shirt, it would take you about two weeks to get it out,” Lee says. “Today, if you put one shirt in, you get it out in two to four hours.”

TAL Group, which calls itself an “innofacturer,” has become known for
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. But Lee tells Quartz that his company is not alone: China’s garment industry has worked to improve quality and speed to stay competitive. That’s because as wages
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(pdf), some production has shifted to
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. “Where labor is still relatively cheap, it’s not as important to be efficient in that way,” he says. But “in China, we definitely have to be a lot more efficient if we’re going to survive.”

A “Made in China” label doesn’t guarantee a good product, of course. It’s a large country that’s still developing, meaning some industrial areas are more advanced than others. Hertzman tells Quartz that determining an item’s quality can only accurately happen on “a factory-to-factory, product-to-product basis.” Still, generally speaking, he says, “sourcing executives have a higher expectation of the fashion and the value-added products coming out of China than other countries.”

The proof, according to Josh Green, CEO of Panjiva, a site that connects sourcing professionals with suppliers, is that despite the rising wages and costs of doing business in China, companies have not walked away. “[China is] viewed by people who make buying decisions as unique and hard to replicate elsewhere,” he says. “If anything, China has developed such advanced capabilities, it’s making it hard for other countries to compete.”
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shen

shen

Senior Member
China-Korea-Japan Free Trade pact is next. But Korean will drive a hard bargain against Japan to keep their exclusive trade benefits with China for as long as possible.

Didn't realize the US exclude SK from TPP. Korean economy not high quality enough for TPP, compare to Vietnam?

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S. Korea, China formally sign free trade deal
 
D

delft

Brigadier
AssassinsMace said:
The US didn't exclude South Korea. It was delayed for the fast track authority vote because the facts show South Korea was the only one to gain between the US and South Korea in the FTA they have now. Obama didn't want that being used against the vote.
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I don't understand this, of course. Might it be that US as "owner" of TPP might end with accepting some of the countries that are now negotiating and not others? :)
 
AssassinsMace

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
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I know a woman who bought an expensive luxury fashion brand blouse made in Europe. It tore like toilet paper as she was putting it on for the first time. What's considered name quality is all hype. What's "delicate" materials in Europe would be cheap crap if used somewhere else.

If these Chinese companies are counting on the world to see their products as luxurious and buy them, they're going to fail. It reminds me of the guy I saw once on TV trying to pitch bottled water from China like it was Evian. China doesn't have that automatic positive prejudice. They're going to have actually work up from the other end to be get where they want.
 
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Lieutenant General
AssassinsMace said:
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I know a woman who bought an expensive luxury fashion brand blouse made in Europe. It tore like toilet paper as she was putting it on for the first time. What's considered name quality is all hype. What's "delicate" materials in Europe would be cheap crap if used somewhere else.

If these Chinese companies are counting on the world to see their products as luxurious and buy them, they're going to fail. It reminds me of the guy I saw once on TV trying to pitch bottled water from China like it was Evian. China doesn't have that automatic positive prejudice. They're going to have actually work up from the other end to be get where they want.
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A lot of so called name brands depend on hype and media coverage. China could always hire or lend one of their brand luxury items to it's movie stars and celebrities during award ceremonies as advertisement.
 
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