Thank God Biden is in Charge of China Policy
I always thought that U.S. Vice President Joe Biden’s reputation as a “gaffe machine” was unfair. Sure, he spoke off the cuff too often for a high profile politician, and yes, some of his statements were regrettable. But I’m a big fan of candor, something sorely lacking in today’s modern political environment.
Vice President Joe Biden warned on Monday that there is no way that China will be able to sustain its current level of economic growth because of what he called its “God-awful” one-child policy.
Biden, who will help host Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping in Washington next week, said that when he visited China in August, he made clear to Beijing that the United States’ fiscal problems were surmountable, and less significant than China’s stood to be.
“When you talk about, we have a problem with our entitlement programs, we are going to be able to handle that, but by God, thank God we don’t have your problem,” Biden said, recalling the trip that followed the U.S. debt ceiling crisis and credit downgrade by Standard & Poor’s.
“Because of that God-awful one-child policy they have, what happens now is in the next 20 years they’re going to have such an inverse proportion of the number of people working to the number of people retired that there is no way they can sustain that growth,” he said.
Let me reiterate: DAMN . . .
Just for the record, this was a genuine gaffe, as defined by Michael Kinsley as “an occurrence of someone telling the truth by accident,” in that Biden basically got his facts right. But to say something like that in public, and with this crappy timing, is unbelievable. And what was with all those “God” references anyway? He has to bring God into a discussion about economics and demographics? Very disappointing.
Biden also wins the condescension gold medal for this rhetorical turd:
[Biden] made clear he was not cheering for slower Chinese economic growth.
“I really want to see China continue to grow. Don’t let the fact that we are 2-1/2 times as large as your economy in any way dissuade you from continuing to work hard,” he said.
Cue the outraged netizens! And just to put this all in perspective, or perhaps make us slightly nauseous, Biden reminded us all:
“I’ve been sort of given part of the China portfolio here,” an apparent reference to reports that President Barack Obama has given him an expanded role in the U.S. policy toward China.
Hallelujah.
The Americans haven’t had a vice president who was good for so many unintentional laughs since…well….Cheney.
If Obama did sorta giveth, I wonder when he will taketh away. I guess Biden got the foot-in-mouth part of the china portfolio.
“Biden basically got his facts right”
No he hasn’t. Joe Biden doesn’t have his numbers right. China’s one child policy isn’t going to cause an inversion in the population. The ‘god aweful’ one child policy is what is helping China here and now economically. What determines if a population’s makeup is a help or a hindrance is the dependency ratio, the ratio between the working population and non-working population. This includes all non-working people, so the elderly retired as well as children, which China has less of because of the one child policy.
China’s dependency ratio has been falling since the 2000′s and will only start to rise later this year 2012. It fell from about 47 dependants per 100 working in 2000 to today’s 36.5 per 100 working persons. And at the rate at which the ratio is rising, China will only reach the 2000 ratio of 47/100 in 2030. I think if China got by fine in the 2000′s with a dependency ratio of 47, it’s not going to be a problem in 2030.
Source: the braniacs at the Rand corporation
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG1009.html
Ctrl + F : Figure 2.13
I’m no expert, but a whole lot of other experts out there say that China’s aging population is going to stress its economy in the future. To the extent that new workers could be added to the economy to support those folks (and their growing social insurance benefits), that would help. The amount of drag that a retiree in 2030 will have on the economy as compared to one in 2000 (benefits sucked then) is probably quite startling.
“a whole lot of other experts out there say that China’s aging population is going to stress its economy in the future”
Of course, but what is a China expert worth nowadays? I don’t know what’s going to happen in 2030 but to say there is going to be an inversion of working people versus non-working people is factually wrong. It would mean that ‘in 20 years’ there would be 36.2 working persons per 100 non-working persons.
“The amount of drag that a retiree in 2030 will have on the economy as compared to one in 2000 (benefits sucked then) is probably quite startling.”
Kind of cold and insensitive but this might be mitigated by the high savings rates in China as these retirees start dying it would unlock a lot of the stored up value in the economy. I don’t the numbers handy but I think people in China has much more in personal savings versus retirement benefits compared to here.
Don’t know how I came across this video or why I thought of this blog but here is Joe “the gaffe” Biden doing an Indian accent during a speech.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzuGFyMM5h8&feature=player_embedded
My favourite part is how he got half through it, then thought better of finishing the impersonation.
Thanks Joe, but I think we’ll stick with Russell Peters instead.