I read a recent article by the Economist magazine and it was very interesting. Essentially it detailed the various ways China, or any other country for that matter, can use to evade trade sanctions. (I am not linking to it because I am sure it is behind a paywall). Paired with the information that China did not meet the terms of the Phase 1 trade deal negotiated with President Trump, and that the Biden administration is continuing to negotiate on the deal, I thought I would look at the data for the radio audience.

I look at two time periods, one from 1985 to the end of 2021 and one from 2012 to 2021. These are not magic dividing lines. I simply wanted a longer time series and a more recent one.

The long trend is clearly for more trade with China overall and imports far exceed exports to China. The drastic drop in early 2020 is due to COVID issues, not any policy regime or change.

For the most part exports to China stayed the same from 2012 to the latest observation. Imports from China increased even as former President Trump imposed tariffs. US consumers kept buying from China even though the prices we faced increased due to the policy.

Clearly policy ideas over the last 9 years really did not create any significant change in the nature of the trade relationship. I am sure the radio audience will have their ideas about that.