… Up until 2000 China’s global economic role had been principally as one of the world’s biggest manufacturers of plastic gubbins and cheap tat. Important, yes, but neither world-beating nor world-changing.
China’s accession to the top table of world trade heralded a massive global transformation. A powerful combination of China’s willing workforce, its super-high-tech factories, and the special relationship between the Chinese government and Western multinational corporations changed the face of the planet.
An army of cheap Chinese labour began to produce the goods that underpin Western living standards, as China seamlessly inserted itself into the supply chains of the world’s biggest companies. Economists call it a “supply shock”, and its impact certainly was shocking. Its effects are still reverberating around the world.
We were sold down the Yangtze river.
